Chapter 22 : THE WARLOCK'S EXAMINATION
"Strip."
Magnus's voice carried no seduction. This was the High Warlock of Brooklyn in professional mode — ancient, clinical, and entirely uninterested in my comfort.
"Excuse me?"
"Shirt off, Alexander. I can't examine your magical signature through three layers of Shadowhunter brooding." He gestured toward an examination table that definitely hadn't been in his loft the last time I visited. "Catarina insisted on being present. She has... concerns."
The blue-skinned woman stood near Magnus's bookshelf, her expression carefully neutral. Catarina Loss — nurse, warlock, one of Magnus's oldest friends. In the show, she'd been a voice of reason. In person, she radiated the particular competence of someone who'd seen every kind of magical disaster.
"I came to discuss ward reinforcement," I said, not moving toward the table. "The Institute's defenses—"
"Will receive my attention after I determine whether you're going to explode." Magnus's cat eyes narrowed. "You've been playing with powers you don't understand. Consuming demons, stretching bonds beyond their natural limits, and according to my observations during our delightful performance for your friends, something fundamental has changed in your soul." He spread his hands. "I'm not helping fortify your Institute until I know the walking weapon inside it isn't a liability."
"I'm not a weapon."
"Everyone's a weapon, darling. The question is who's holding the trigger." He pointed at the table again. "Shirt. Off. Now."
I removed my jacket and shirt, feeling exposed in a way that had nothing to do with bare skin. The demon claw marks from the attack had faded to pink lines across my arm — healing fast, faster than normal.
"Those should still be open wounds," Catarina observed, moving closer. "Three days old and nearly healed? That's not standard Shadowhunter recovery."
"I heal quickly."
"You heal wrong." She reached out, blue fingers hovering over my chest without touching. Light gathered at her fingertips — diagnostic magic, probing rather than attacking. "May I?"
I nodded.
The sensation was invasive. Not painful, but deeply uncomfortable — like someone running fingers through the filing cabinets of my mind while I tried to act natural. Catarina's expression shifted from clinical interest to confusion to something closer to alarm.
"Magnus."
He joined her, adding his own magical touch to the examination. Gold and blue intertwined against my skin, and I watched their faces as they found whatever was wrong with me.
"That's impossible," Catarina whispered.
"Improbable," Magnus corrected. "But we're looking at it."
"What?" The word came out steadier than I felt. "What are you seeing?"
Magnus met my eyes, and for the first time since I'd known him, he looked genuinely unsettled.
"Your soul vibrates wrong, Alexander. It's like..." He paused, searching for words. "Two frequencies overlaid. Two patterns trying to occupy the same space. One is you — Nephilim, runed, connected to your angelic heritage. The other is... something else."
The transmigrator and the body. Never quite one thing.
"Demonic corruption?" I offered the excuse I'd prepared. "The consumption ability—"
"No." Catarina cut me off. "Demonic energy leaves a specific signature. This isn't that. This is..." She shook her head. "I don't know what this is. I've never seen anything like it."
"The rune perception, the bond expansion, the accelerated healing — they're all connected to this... doubling." Magnus withdrew his magic, expression troubled. "You're not supposed to exist, Alexander. Whatever you are, you're breaking rules I didn't know existed."
The silence stretched between us. My shirt lay across the examination table, and I felt more naked than bare skin could account for.
"Can you tell anyone?" The question hung in the air like a blade. "The Clave, other warlocks—"
"I'm many things, darling, but an informant isn't one of them." Magnus's voice softened slightly. "Your secrets are your own. But I need you to understand: whatever you've done, whatever was done to you — it's not stable. The two frequencies are interfering with each other. Eventually, something has to give."
"How long?"
"I don't know. Months? Years? Or it could resolve itself tomorrow." He touched my cheek — the first intimate gesture, fingers gentle against my jaw. "I'd prefer you didn't become a cautionary tale, Alexander. They're quite boring, and I suspect you're far more interesting than that."
Catarina excused herself shortly after, taking her concerns and her diagnostic notes to wherever ancient warlocks stored impossible observations. Magnus and I remained in his loft, the examination table pushed aside, something different settling into the space between us.
"The wards," I said finally. "Will you still help?"
"I'll reinforce them personally. Multi-layered protections, demonic detection, the whole elaborate display." He poured two drinks from his bar — whiskey, the good kind. "But I want something in return."
"What?"
"Honesty." He handed me a glass. "Not about the soul thing — I understand secrets. But about this." He gestured between us. "Whatever's forming here. I need to know if it's real or just another performance."
The question cut deeper than his magic had. Because the truth was: I didn't know. Magnus Bane was supposed to be Alec Lightwood's great love, the romance that defined this story. But was I pursuing him because I wanted to, or because the script said I should?
"I don't know," I admitted. "I know that when I'm here, I feel less like a fraud than I do everywhere else. I know that you see something in me that others don't — something I'm not sure I want them to see. And I know that watching you work, watching you exist..." I trailed off. "You're four hundred years old. You've seen everything, done everything. And somehow you still care. About people. About doing the right thing. That's..." I shook my head. "I don't have words for what that is."
Magnus studied me for a long moment. Then he smiled — not the performance smile, the real one.
"That might be the most honest thing you've ever said to me."
"Probably."
"I can work with probably." He clinked his glass against mine. "To uncertain futures and improbable souls."
We drank. And for a few minutes, I let myself forget about Valentine and Sebastian and the war coming for all of us.
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