downworld boy

“Of course I am sure.” He said with full conviction. He knew his wife, for centuries he knew her now. And she knew him. He knew there would not be a second of hesitation in which she did not know he asked his son to leave him there to get to safety, to inform her. Eli would just know. Mainly because she knew him. She had seen him lose control when they accused his wife of witchcraft. He had been hanged for it, while she lived due to her pregnancy. Well, she knew he could overreact if it was to protect loved ones.  

And then his kid revealed his true feelings. He wanted his mom. He wanted the mother figure he saw in Eli or his mother, he was probably not really picky. He just wanted a mother to hold him. He couldn’t give him his Mom right now. But his dad. So he just wrapped his arms around Alf and pulled him towards him so he could basically cuddle into him.

“I know you want Mom. For now, Dad will have to do.”

Alfred knew, in his still heart, that Jake was right. Eli would have welcomed him back, but it didn’t seem like it in the spur of the moment, he’d had no time to think rationally. Rationality wasn’t his best trait either. “She’ll be going mad won’t she.” Alfred said, his voice little more than a whisper as he looked at Jake. She wouldn’t know. Jake was right, he could have gone to Eli, let her know what had happened, but who was to say they wouldn’t have killed him there and then? 

He leaned into Jake, slight build that never grew out of the skinny lanky phase firmly snuggled into the arms of his dad. Prior to his vampire status, Alf had thought he would never know a father’s love, and he had been resigned to that. Until, Jake and Eli had found him, and taken him under their wing. How he loved them for that. 

He was surprised at his sons words. Yeah, he had expected that kind of loyalty. He had years of raising kids, knew them in so many ways. And he had known when Alfred had let them in and from that moment onward he had developed loyalty to his warlock parents, to him and Eli and every single one of his siblings. He had taken to Mara naturally as she was a vampire like him. She understood the unique position they held, she could teach him a thing or two about their condition that Jake never could. He knew he did not want him to die. He knew he didn’t want to lose him. But the fear he expressed about Eli… no, Jake could not let that stand.

Jake crawled over to his son on bound hands. He placed them on his cheeks and almost smiled at him, hands slightly trembling form how unnatural it felt to be bound. He had a son to comfort. He had an idea to set straight in his head. “No, Alfred. Eli could never, ever hate you.” He said. “Especially not for this. She would know I asked you to leave. She would know you left me behind because I asked you to, because I wanted you to run. She would know you wouldn’t leave me behind out of your own volition, but to do as I said and to live to fight another day. To get help. Eli loves you so much. You’re our son. She would never, ever hate you. She isn’t capable of that. She would dote on you and make plans to save me, but hate you? She doesn’t have that emotion in her heart. Not for her children. Not for her little boy.”

He hated himself. But he knew he’d have hated himself for leaving Jake alone even more. His father’s hands, bound though they may be, on his cheeks calmed Alf, and he managed a small smile in return. 

He knew, realistically that Jake was right about Eli, Jake would be the same too. They had opened their homes to a quite frankly almost feral fledgling vampire, and brought him into their family. He could not be more grateful to them. But, he’d seen how they were around each other, watched how much they cared, and he can’t shake the idea that if he had someone he loved that much, that he would blame the person that returned if they didn’t. “Do you really think she wouldn’t have looked at me and just seen the vampire who couldn’t move fast enough to get us both back.” He had enhanced speed, and still hadn’t been able to react in time. 

His instinct changed instantly. He wanted him to run. he needed him to run and yet Alfred had stayed, probably afraid that they would kill him. But Jake wanted him to be safe, to go back to Eli and tell her what happened and at least assure her that he was safe and… have them start searching for Mara. Oh Mara, his sweet girl. If what he saw was right he was on his knees in front of his daughters pyre, having lost her forever. 

And alf, his boy, was right there, in danger. They killed these vampires, what was to stop them from throwing Alf into the burning building?

“Don’t hurt him.” Jake almost mirrored his sons plea. He knew it gave away that the two cared deeply about each other. It revealed that having one gave them power over the other and almost immediately they grabbed the vampire and threateened him in an equal fashion, with blades turned to the kid as well.

“Open a portal.” They ordered the warlock. While they didn’t utter a threat against Alfred, he knew circle members red ruthless. They would kill Alfred if he didn’t behave and that was the one thing he didn’t want to see, so Jake opened a portal. As soon as that was done, the circle members grabbed his arms ad tied his hands painfully and so tightly they he could no longer move them, let alone use them for magic. he was virtually powerless as they dragged him through the portal.

They were in a drafty place, like an old castle. He hadn’t seen this place before. A bunch of young shadowhunters, all wearing the same rune. They smirked. “Throw them in a cell.” They dragged them downstairs to a cell. The steel was reinforced, so that neither of them could break out even if they wanted to. And with his hands out of the count, there was no way he could magic them out. Once the door closed, he slumped to his knees. “Alf… I am so sorry. Why didn’t you run?”

His hands shook, when they grabbed him, hanging uselessly by his side. He should be kicking and screaming. His brain screamed at him, shooting off messages to his frozen limbs, yelling out to fight. He quelled the urge. Jake still had a blade to his neck, and now so did he. A horrible stand off of threats. The blade inches from him, seemed to radiate cold, as cold as his ever icy skin. It was a cold heat that filled him with agonising dread. He’d died once, he remembered how much it had hurt. The second time, he wouldn’t be crawling out of his grave. 

He’d just be dead. 

Why didn’t they kill him? Jake, he understood, not many a warlock could claim to have lived so many years, and those years brought power. Alf supposed the Shadowhunters now saw him, the lowly vampire, as leverage and insurance to keep the Warlock in check. He stumbled rather than walked through the portal. Travelling via portal had long since made him uneasy, but there was a queasy feeling in his stomach, like the time he’d tried eating pizza again and found that mundie food and him no longer got along. 

The slam of the cell door, for his enhanced hearing was decibels off blowing his ear drums. They were really trapped. These weren’t the same Shadowhunters he had run into sparsely over the years, they understood, had stopped to listen and realised that Alf hadn’t broken the accords. 

He hated seeing his father so despondent. Jake was right, he should have run. But, it hadn’t seemed that simple. “I couldn’t, what if they’d killed you.” It could very well have been an empty threat, but he wasn’t about to risk that. He thought of his biological father, the man he’d only ever seen in grainy images, his sire who’d disappeared after turning him and to lose Jake too, would have killed Alf. 

@agcless

As things were getting dangerous Eli and Jake had made a point in visiting their children that had moved on to their own lives to make sure they were all save and knew how to take care of themselves. Most of them chuckled at their adoptive parents worry, but they couldn’t get it out of them. Ever since adopting their first child - a beautiful warlock girl with colorful scales that could hypnotize everyone, if she wanted to show them - they were both quite the doting parents, not just for warlocks.

Their son Alfred was with Jake as he went to visit one of his daughters to make sure she was safe. She was a vampire, like Alfred, living in Madrid. But as they arrived at her place, they found it burning. Jake froze in fear for a moment, before rushing forward, panic and pain gripping him as he called out for her “MARA!!” It made him careless - and borderline stupid, it would seem as he didn’t notice the Shadowhunters and their torches until he had run straight into them. It was a short little fight, the shadowhunters had the distraught father overpowered within moments. They had him on his knees, seraph blades to his neck as they caught sight of his son.

“Alfred…run.” Jake chocked out. But the man, a rune he had been terrified to see prominent on his neck, spoke to Alfred as well.

“Make one move and we cut off his neck.”, he warned the young vampire. “We take both of them with us. Valentine wanted some specimen for his experiments anyway.” the man added to his fellows.

It was so bright when they arrived, the orange flicker lighting up the air in front of them, that for a minute Alfred thought it was sunrise already. But he knew that it couldn’t be, his adoptive father would never have risked him turning to ash like that. He loved and trusted both warlocks, implicitly. Ash and smoke rose, clouding the air and it felt thick even for the boy who no longer needed to breathe.

He was close to Mara, both bonding over their un-dead immortal status in a house full of Warlocks and the trip to see her had been one he’d been excited about despite the circumstances. He could only hope that Mara had fled, pray she wasn’t inside. Alf could feel the heat from there, it licked at his cool skin, and he flinched. He was a second behind Jake, a second long enough to see the Shadowhunters. By the time he could open his mouth to warn his father, it was too late, they were already fighting. He could swear he felt his heart pace in his chest, though it was very still, his utter terror evident in his chestnut hues.

“Dad,” he whimpered. He watched the scene in front of him, shaking, his fangs sliding down as he snarled at the Shadowhunters. 

(It had taken him a while to take to calling Jake, dad and even longer to call Eli, mum. But with the other downworld children around him, it had eventually become second nature.)

“Maybe it’s the finding a kindred spirit in another guitarist, but it’s gotta be Richards for me. Jagger might be the front man, one HELL of a front man I might add, but you wouldn’t have a show without that guy shredding all night, y’know?” His own unbeating heart ached for the other man. Oh, what he would do if his mother DARED throw away his vinyls, his countless collections of…what in 200 years would more than likely hold only sentimental value to himself. “And to be honest, if anyone’s one of us? S’Keith Richards. Dude’s probably ingested enough drugs to kill a freaking angel.” 

“More of a Stones man? From what I know, people were either one or the other. Don’t get me wrong, I’m a fan of both, but… Stones just got that longevity, dude.” Simon grinned, ever enthusiastic when music was the topic at hand. “PLUS, blues has all that soul. Those pasty British guys managed to keep up with some of the biggest names in blues HISTORY. Rolling Stones are just SO much cooler. And basically all still alive which is the real freakin’ miracle.”