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The mutability of blood, the way it flows freely from his vein to Simon’s mouth is like acquiring a new rune. The sting is different, but the essence, the heady mixture of power and surrender, is the same. You trust the stele to guide you in the Angel’s name…and this is demon work, so he will let this mark sink into his flesh just like the others and absorb it until it fades.
The only problem is that the sting doesn’t stop.
The pain, like the blood, is mutable, never the same. From moment to moment, it shifts into climates; hot, cool, warm, freezing, gently soothing, searing and sharp. He sees a world of red; carmine tissue, crimson web, russet tendons. A burgundy of lips and cherry teeth. His body, a vermilion pond, overflowing its banks, a copper taste on his tongue, a scarlet brilliance. He feels like a vampire.
Who is he right now? Where is he?
Why has he never felt this pleasure before? How could he have lived so long without it? Who deprived him of this supreme right? To pour himself into someone else until there is nothing left, to hemorrhage on someone’s lips. To be nothing except this leakage. It’s pure hedonism. The kind of desire that feeds on more desire.
He sees a falcon flying in the sun and he wants to grip its bloody wings and kill it himself before his father gets the chance to do it. He feels he could turn back the time and undo everything if only Simon would drink more.
Jace fragments his own name, thinks of his dead un-mother, of his father watching him being depleted.
A warm light covers every gap in his body, fills it with the sunshine of gods. The angels are feeble in comparison.
The tear trails down his foreign cheek and feels as warm as the light.
He wants to die in Simon’s arms, and he wants Simon to drink his tears too.
And when he’s dead, he wants something beyond death. The vampire’s venom makes him dream of shadows, the secret place where they dwell, the place where Simon will undo him, bit by bit. He is a Shadow-hunter, it seems like his destiny.
It ends too quickly when they are pulled apart by strong hands.
Simon watches as Clary becomes Jace right before his eyes and though there should be a look of horror on his face, his every feature reflects loss.
They are both mirroring stolen desire. Something has been taken from them.
Simon’s stomach rumbles with infinite hunger and Jace’s mouth parts with yearning.
They are still in the same dream, where blood governs everything.
They’ve never left.
It doesn’t strike Simon until later what Jace told him.
I would've let you.
He takes it, at first, as a confirmation of the Shadowhunter’s obnoxious but commendable instinct for self-sacrifice. Jace feels cursed with sin, so he must always atone for something. It drives Simon mad, how easy nobility comes to this ridiculous, arrogant Adonis. It seems incongruous that a handsome asshole should yearn for effacement.
But as he laughs in the gift of sunlight which has been granted him, he catches a blond reflection, warm as honey, warmer than the sun.
Jace is watching him from afar. He is standing on the Institute stairs, arms folded, face stark.
Simon stops running for a moment, catches his breath, and looks back.
Nothing betrays either of them.
But Simon understands somehow. Maybe it’s the air between them that still smells of blood.
Maybe it's the abbreviation. Would've. Jace rushed through his confession. What is in the space between "would" and have"?
Simon knows.
I would've let you is not a selfless anthem.
It’s a selfish cry for pleasure. I would've let you, because it felt so good.
“Hey, um, I guess I should thank you.”
Jace rolls his eyes, affecting weariness, although all his senses are alert. The vampire venom has not washed away from his system yet, and the source is too close for comfort.
“There are many things you should be thanking me for. Maybe I should draw up a list.”
Simon laughs nervously, running a hand through his disheveled hair. It looks as if he’s been doing that a lot, as if he’s worked up the courage to come to the control room and talk to him.
“I guess first for the sunshine,” he says, softly, too softly. Simon clears his throat. Why can’t he ever feel like Jace’s equal? Why is there always a stone in his throat when he looks at this devastatingly handsome jerk?
Jace inhales and pushes the air out quickly, as if he can’t stand the smell. There are still shades of red coloring the edge of his vision.
“I mean, I drank your blood and then suddenly, I’m frolicking in the sun? That’s no coincidence.”
Jace smirks, but it feels like a grimace. “Probably don’t call it frolicking.”
“Right,” Simon laughs again, eyes wide and dark and expectant. There’s so much of the boy in him still, but Jace can see the soft tips of his fangs and he has to look away.
“But really…” the vampire continues hesitantly, “thanks for that. You don’t know how much it means to me.”
“Glad to be of service,” he drawls, and only afterwards realizes it sounded more provocative than it should. It’s the venom.
“Well…I just wanted to tell you, if you ever need anything, I’m your man. I’m in your debt, as they say,” and he reaches out in what’s supposed to be an amicable gesture and taps Jace on the chest, but the contact sends them both reeling.
It’s too soon after the leak. It opens wounds.
“I’ll – I’ll remember that,” Jace manages through gritted teeth.
“So…is there anything you need right now?” Simon offers, all innocent smiles, fangs peeking through his lips.
“Fuck.”
They never tell you the second time is so much worse. And so, so much better.
You’ve already been opened, the rupture only widens and you welcome it.
By the Angel, he really enjoys the way Simon slams him against the wall. Being overwhelmed is heavenly.
The vampire’s got one hand around his neck, keeping him still. Simon can feel Jace's jugular throbbing underneath his palm, and he wants to go straight for the throat and make him cry out, begging for release.
But he must practice control, he must not be greedy.
What did Raphael tell him? Shadowhunter blood is lethal, addictive, like catnip. He must be careful.
Still, the fact that Jace’s heart pumps blood so fast through his veins for him, for Simon, makes the vampire groan as he sinks his fangs into Jace’s open wrist. His mouth is a cruel leech, a gentle lover.
Jace lets his head fall back against the wall.
He knows this time there’s no danger Simon won’t stop. It’s not about limits, really. It’s about how much pleasure they can steal from each other.
They can only do this here, and now, in the shadows, where they both dwell and hunt and feed.
When Jace lets out the expletive a second time (a deep, mournful “fuuuck…”) Simon smiles into the river of blood. Cherry teeth.
(When he finally unlatches his mouth from Jace’s wrist they are both breathing like sharks. And he doesn’t know who moves first, who drags who down. He’s never felt his equal, because there is no balance between them, no potential for evenness. They are like cliffs, like the jagged tips of mountains.)
(His scarlet lips are crushed against Jace’s and the Shadowhunter is tasting himself. The mutability of blood is intoxicating. Their bodies are pulled together by invisible strings and he’s never realized how much the flesh can cover, how much the muscles can contain, how rough and gentle Jace’s hands are against his cheeks as he deepens the kiss and tastes more and more of his own blood, wanting to know what it is that has bewitched them both.)
(He knows now there was never any demon blood inside of him, but he wants a transfusion. He believes one has already taken place because he feels Simon coursing through him, and it is holy.)
(The beautiful, arrogant boy releases him with a gasp and walks away, business as usual. His body is rigid again, his posture signaling a return to the world where red is kept inside the mouth and nowhere else.)
(But there will be a third time and a fourth. And each time will be better and worse. Each time it starts with Simon asking him if he needs anything.)
(And Jace always does.)
(He always does.)