The Red Scrolls of Magic (The Eldest Curses, #1)(62)

“I’m sure you’ve learned more than you wanted to,” said Magnus quietly.

“I learned you see snarling animals in cages, and you try to pet them. Your friend died, and you didn’t even tell me you knew him, but you tried to comfort a vampire about it. You’re always trying to help people. Me and my friends, so many times, and Raphael Santiago of all people, and now Shinyun and other warlock kids, and probably loads of people I don’t know about yet, but I know this much. I looked at the Red Scrolls of Magic and saw you trying to help children. That part sounded like you.”

Magnus laughed, an uneven sound.

“Was that what you meant? I thought you meant—something else.” He closed his eyes. “I don’t want this not to work because of me,” he confessed. “I don’t want to shatter what we have by telling you something that will drive you away. How much truth do you really want, Alexander?”

“I want all of it,” said Alec.

Magnus turned his eyes, brighter than firelight, on Alec, and held out his hand. Alec took his hand firmly, drew in his breath, and braced himself. His heart thundered in his chest and his stomach twisted. He waited.

“Um,” he said. “Aren’t you going to do some magic that shows me your past?”

“Oh, heavens no,” said Magnus. “That whole business was traumatic enough to live through once. I was just going to talk about it. I wanted to hold your hand.”

“Oh,” said Alec. “Well . . . good.”

Magnus slid in close. Alec could feel the heat radiating off his skin. The warlock bowed his head as he gathered his thoughts. He made a few false starts at speaking, and each time he gripped Alec’s hand tighter.

“I’d like to think my mother loved me,” said Magnus. “All I remember is that she was so sad. I always felt as if I had to learn some trick to figure out how to do better. I thought I could prove myself, and she would be happy, and I’d be good enough. I never learned the trick. She hanged herself in the barn. My stepfather burned the barn to the ground and built a shrine to her in the ashes. He didn’t know exactly what I was. I didn’t know exactly what I was, but he knew I was not his. He knew I was not human. One day when the air was hot as soup, I was sleeping and woke to hear him calling me.”

Magnus smiled as if his heart was broken. “He used my old name, the one my mother gave me. There is nobody left alive who knows that name now.”

Alec held Magnus’s hand even tighter, as if he could rescue him, centuries too late.

“You don’t have to say anything more,” he whispered. “Not if you don’t want to.”

“I want to,” said Magnus, but his voice wavered as he continued. “My stepfather hit me a few times, then hauled me by the neck to the burnt ruins of the barn. There was still a blackened rope hanging from a rafter. I could hear the water of the creek running. My stepfather grabbed me by the nape of my neck and pushed my head into the water. Just before he did, he spoke to me, and he sounded gentler than I’d ever heard him sound before. He said, ‘This is to purify you. Trust me.’?”

Alec’s breath caught. He found he could not stop holding it, as if he could save it for the child Magnus had been.

“I don’t remember what happened after that. One minute I was drowning.” There was a pause. Magnus held his hands up. His voice was devoid of emotion. “The next, I burned my stepfather alive.”

The campfire erupted into a column of flame, roiling in a funnel that shot halfway up to heaven. Alec threw an arm in front of Magnus to shield him from the scorching blast.

The pillar of flame died away almost at once. Magnus did not even seem to notice the giant column of fire he had created. Alec wondered if Shinyun had woken up, but if she had, there was no sign. Maybe she slept with earplugs in.

“I ran away,” Magnus continued. “I was in hiding, until I crossed paths with the Silent Brothers. They taught me how to control my magic. I was always fonder of Shadowhunters than most warlocks, because your Silent Brothers saved me from myself. I still thought I was a demon’s child and could never be anything more. I’d never met another warlock, but Ragnor Fell had ties to a Shadowhunter family. The Silent Brothers arranged for him to come and teach me. I was the first pupil he ever had. Later he tried to teach Shadowhunter children about magic, and not to fear us. He said all his pupils were terrible, but I was the worst. He complained constantly. Nothing ever made him happy. I loved him very much.” Magnus’s mouth twisted as he stared intently into the flames. “A little while later I met my second friend, Catarina Loss. Some mundanes were trying to burn her at the stake. I intervened.”

“I knew I was going to find out about you saving more people,” said Alec.

Magnus gave a soft, surprised huff of laughter. Alec caught Magnus’s upraised hands in his own, warming them and holding them steady, drawing Magnus closer to him. Magnus did not resist, and Alec enveloped him in a tight embrace. He locked his arms around Magnus’s slim body, felt their chests rising and falling against each other, and held him fast. Magnus let his head drop onto Alec’s shoulder.

“You saved yourself,” Alec said into Magnus’s ear. “You saved yourself, and then you saved so many people. You couldn’t have saved anyone if you hadn’t saved yourself. I would never have found you.”