[rubs hands queerly]

Kit and Ash began seeing each other in dreams like. Years before TWP began.

So, picture this. You're Kit. You just went to bed after a grueling day of being trained by James Carstairs, former shadowhunter extraordinaire. You are also ever so acutely aware that your cousin Jace is coming over tomorrow and that he will make you lose the last remaining slivers of your will to live via rigorous training. The only comfort is that Simon is also going to suffer death by Jace.

You are, understandably, exhausted and eager to sleep. So you do just that. And promptly find yourself in the middle of the fucking woods in the dead of fucking winter.

Now, you are no stranger to weird dreams. You've been having them most of your life and yes, they've gotten considerably worse since your father died, and significantly worse still since what happened with Livvy and Ty. But there's different categories to them. There's Ty dreams, there's Livvy dreams, there's Johnny Rook dreams, and then there are...The Dreams.

The Dreams usually consist of incredibly disturbing and foreign images that feel at once bewildering and yet painfully, sorrowfully nostalgic. There's a pang of recognition every time, like a blow, amongst the blood and the grit and the whispers of your dreams. There's a lot of bronze and a lot of white, a lot of fire and a lot of fights, and you can't ever make sense of them. You try. God, do you try. But the only thing there is dread, heavy and solid, and the creeping feeling that you've already lost something deeply precious.

Now, the woods you are in, even though you just went to sleep? This doesn't fit any category, except maybe sleepwalking. Because although things are hazy, idyllic, whimsical—they're pretty real, too. The snow burns along the bridge of your nose and melts on your lashes, even though the cold doesn't make you shiver. The flower petals and pine needles under your feet crunch softly when you turn in a circle. When you inhale, the air is crisp and harsh in your lungs, even if it isn't unpleasant. And you can tell at once, because there's that tingle of recognition down your spine, a familiarity you cannot describe—you're in the Faerilands. The one place where you're never supposed to go. Figures.

You don't hear the footsteps so much as you feel them. All that training is paying off, because something at the back of your neck prickles, some long-dormant instinct, and when you turn, it's quick and graceful and practiced. You're not sure what you expect to see—maybe assassins, maybe a ghost, maybe a monster, maybe none of the above—but it's certainly not a guy staring at you with Clary Fairchild's eyes.

The comparison is not apt. Clary's gaze is warm and kind and welcoming. The gaze that stares at you now is frigid and sharp and predatory, meditating on all the ways to take you apart, same as you analyze all the ways in which the parts that make people up come together. It's dark and deep and it cuts you to the quick.

And then you feel it, as you lock eyes, trembling down your spine, zinging through your skin.

Ah.

There's that recognition again, quick and firm and brutal. Except this time, it's not a suggestion. It's not a vague feeling. It's a certainty, bone-deep, that tells you you know this guy and he knows you. You know him on a level that you're not used to knowing people, even though you don't know him at all. You're sure you could pick him apart, even though you couldn't even say his name. You're sure the same familiarity is buzzing through him.

And you think, fuck you. Because isn't it just so convenient that this guy—a fae, at that, because you can see it and feel it—is another part of all the reasons you fear for your life and your family's life even on your best days. And isn't so convenient that you know him. And isn't it so convenient that he knows you. And isn’t it so annoying that you want to know him. You already are starting to, picking apart what makes him tick, just like you were raised to. Old habits die hard.

When he asks your name, his voice is smooth like honey and pleasant, even though it's flat and distant and cold. You get the feeling you should fall right under the syrup and swallow it up. You get the feeling you could, if you were so inclined to.

As it is, all you feel is annoyance, because you can feel the magic in him like a languid current, like the currents wading around you the longer you stand here staring at him, and you know that you're expected to fall in line and answer him and love him.

So you tell him, "Wouldn't you like to know, weatherboy," and the next thing you know, as his face contorts incredulously, Mina is shrieking her delight and jumping in your bed as Oscar the dog (well, technically the ghost) pants by your feet.

Three days later, you wander into the same woods, and find him cleaning the sword that had hung by his hip last time. He asks you your name again. You ask him his. You play hot potato like this for four more visits, much to your mutual and evident dismay, and valiantly do not try to kill each other, though the tension is as tangible a force as the string pulling them into the same space to begin with.

You see him several times a week, whether you want to or not. Sometimes he wanders into your dreams. Sometimes you wander into his. More often than not, you wander into each other in the liminal space of the Faerilands, where the seasons change alarmingly fast but he does not, except for the fact that his skin gradually begins to swirl with runes.

You never stop seeing him after that.

You don't really know how to feel about that.

Like, at all.

This is sort of implied by the last one, but: Kit isn’t actually affected by the perfect loyalty spell.

That’s not to say he’s not aware of it. In fact, he’s hyper-aware of it and everything else related to Ash. Hell, being around Ash is like being turned into a live wire with how fucking aware he is. And it doesn’t really take a genius to figure out why, with who Kit is. What he is.

Ash is appealing to him in every sense of the manner, because Kit is pretty sure fae are built to be appealing in every sense of the manner. His voice, his face, his bone structure, his eyes, the way he talks, the way he moves, even his scent—all of it is honey a fly, and if any common fae attracts a swarm, Kit can only imagine how many Ash calls to him. He’s perfectly charming and he’s, quite literally, enchanting. Kit would have to be dead not to notice, and then dead again because even a vampire could tell and be trapped by it.

But.

But being conscious of it does not in any way mean Kit is swayed by it.

He could be, he thinks, if he allowed it. It’d be quite easy, actually, because it’s just as easy to blink away the film that Ash’s existence tries to drag over his eyes. It’s second nature, in fact. So, it could be third nature to let it in instead of keeping it out, if he were so inclined. 

But that would have to be a conscious decision, which he finds about as appealing as getting stabbed in the gut. As it is, it washes over him like water off a duck’s back, slippery and insistent and curious. Different than the buzz of when they come into contact, or the currents that seem to thicken between them whenever they’re in the same vicinity, tumultuous and arresting. But familiar nonetheless. Familiar the way many things about Ash are, even when they feel jarringly foreign.

The magic is strong, like a waterfall right like over Kit’s head whenever Ash so much as looks his way, but it’s easy to be distracted from it by other things. It’s not uncomfortable, not like the pressure of their proximity; in fact, it can even be pleasant. It soothes Kit’s rage considerably, which means he just gets angrier out of seemingly reflexive spite, and it relaxes him, which makes him want to tense up just to prove a point. And he does. Until he doesn’t.

But the fact of the matter is that he doesn’t feel beholden to it in the least.

In fact, he finds it annoying as hell, because he can tell that he’s supposed to fall head over ass in a quest to make Ash his number one priority at all costs, and that’s more than vaguely insulting. So much so that it makes Kit feel more than vaguely murderous. It makes him more furious than anything has since he had to accept that he was a Herondale when the rug got yanked out from under him.

But with time, he ever so reluctantly lets it go, because although Ash seems confused as to why it doesn’t work—and wasn’t that a fucking woozy—he also seems vaguely, ever-so-slightly, ever-so-secretly pleased. Kit has never met anyone that even somewhat enjoyed being brutally and viciously and very vocally hated, but he supposes there’s a first time for everything.

(Needless to say, Ash is pleased because that means that, whatever Kit feels toward him—be it negative, positive, both or neither—is fully, wholly, entirely real. It’s genuine. And he’s never really had that. So he’s more than a little delighted to experience it. Even if Kit is incredibly annoying.)

Ash and Kit struggle with touching each other.

There's definitely some trauma reasons behind this. Undoubtedly.

Kit has gone without affection for most of his life and that has left its mark, even if he now has all the affection one could would, via his family.

On the other hand, Ash has a very long history with touch signifying pain. It's been weaponized against him, until he associates it with violence.

The point is, they have a shit history with touch and that certainty influences Le Situation.

But, in truth, there's also a magical aspect to it.

Namely, how the magic between them interacts.

Both Kit and Ash are one of kind, in their own respective ways. There's nobody else like them, not anymore. There may never be anyone like them ever again. And what they do know for a fact is that people like them have never interacted the way they try to.

Hence, the first they touch, it's...interesting.

It's not entirely deliberate. They could call it an accident, but the truth is that very little between the two of them can ever be defined as wholly accidental, because of the very nature of their interactions. Thus, it's not entirely planned. It is, mostly, accidental.

They're skipping rocks, one of their past times that is less likely to end in them trying to kill each other, and Ash offers Kit a rock. It isn't peaceful in the least, but it is companionable, as comfortable as they've been able to get, and their conversation is civil, for a change.

Hence, when Kit offers a rock, another one of their many sharp, double-edged olive branches, Ash doesn't hesitate to grasp it.

It's just a brush of their fingers as the rock trades hands, just knuckles knocking together and calloused fingertips rubbing against each other, nails catching on skin. At least, it's supposed to be.

In truth, their fingers barely begins to brush before they feel it, thick and pulsing and firm between them, like shoving your hand straight into a river's current and trying to push back against it. The pressure is immediate and it is brutal, the live-wire buzz that their proximity constantly hums climbing to the beginning of a burn, flaming up and down their spines like they've come into contact with heavenly fire.

It's a frisson spreading over them, lightning striking down the knobs of their spinal cords and tingling through their skin. It isn't painful, no, but it's uncomfortable, unsettling. It sets off their instincts, warning bells and panic, in the way standing at the edge of a cliff does. Like standing too close to a fire.

At once, they flinch away, hands hovering inches away from each other, the magic constantly surrounding them thickening into something that's almost fucking visible. They've been like magnets since they met, pulled together by something other than themselves, and now, just like when poles face each other, they're bouncing off each other.

They look at each other, confused brows and wide eyes, Kit's mouth half-open with surprise, a question there. He doesn't need to ask for Ash to nod, a confirmation that Kit hasn't lost his mind. Kit alternates between the rock and Ash's too-still fingers, squinting. Ash looks between their hands and Kit's eyes like the answer will spell itself out if he glowers long enough.

No such luck. As it is, Ash readjusts his stance and slowly, ever so carefully, reaches out again. Kit tenses, bracing against whatever is about to happen, keeping his hand still and out snd steady.

As their hands near, it happens again; the currents between them harden, packed air and running waves, and Ash's brow furrows, even as his jaw clenches stubbornly. Instead of relenting, he pushes forward, further and further and further, mouth curdling into a grimace and breath freezing in his lungs with every milimeter he pushes through.

Kit tenses further and further with each one, face pinched with the same discomfort shuddering its way through Ash's body. It's like a fucking mantle over each of them, reacting only to each other. Reacting because of each other.

By the time their fingers are about to touch, it's taking all of Kit's self-control not to snatch his hand away. Now, it almost stings, standing on the knife's edge between discomfort and pain. Everything with Ash is heightened and quick and vicious. He doesn't want to find out how this is gonna feel.

But Ash doesn't touch him. He doesn't even try. Instead, he very carefully, very deliberately avoids it, pinching the rock between his fingers and all but snatching his hand away, stumbling half a step backwards with the pressure of it all.

Kit doesn't realize he'd been holding his breath until he finally exhales in relief, chest and throat burning with it, and he doesn't care about apperances for once. He presses his hands over his knees and bends over as he pants, acutely aware of the shivers wracking through him, sparks bursting behind his eyes.

He can tell that Ash isn't doing any better, not because he can see it, but because he can feel it. For the few moments it takes him to stabilize his galloping heart and his breathing, he can feel Ash's own, faster than he's ever seen them, unsteady and messy.

And then he blinks his eyes open and Ash is alright, perfectly composed, perfectly okay—except his fist has clenched into a vice around the rock, knuckles bone-white and trembling, blood drip-drip-dripping from their crevices easily.

Kit straightens up, calm spreading over him at the sight of something he fix, at the sign that he wasn't the only one rattled by the event.

And so he pointed at it and said, "Iratze."

And Ash's gaze snapped to him, startled, another one of those moments when Kit remembered that Ash experienced the world and its pains in ways utterly foreign to Kit. Slowly, his green eyes fell to his hand, fingers slowly uncurling from the rock, exposing bloody palms and jagged cuts. A frown adorned his porcelain features, a shadow crossing his eyes. There he went again.

With a sigh, Kit pulled his stele out from his pocket and leaned over, careful to make sure no part of them brushed, gritting his teeth around the currents of resistance as they got ever closer. Ash did not flinch, though alarm flashed over his eyes.

It was the hardest iratze of Kit's life, drawn sloppily over the bump of Ash's wrist bone. It wasn't perfect and it wouldn't work as such, but it'd do.

True to form, when Ash skipped his rock, it was with perfect accuracy, and his hand came back healed, even though he had to wash it out in order to actually see it.

They didn't touch again for a long time.

Fae's real names hold weight, right? Not with hybrids, as we know, but what if it was, instinctively, the principle of the thing. (AKA, Kit introduces himself as Christopher.)

During Kit and Ash's game of name hot potato, it is, surprisingly, Ash that finally gives.

They've been at this for weeks and honestly, little progress has been made. He knows Kit has a sister and a cousin, he knows he's no good with words but he's clever, he knows that Kit knows him even though he does not want to, which is a mutual feeling. He also knows that Kit is completely immune to his—literal—charms.

Kit is a walking, talking obstacle. Ash wouldn't mind cutting him down like a weed.

Except.

Though it's true he doesn't really seem to have a choice in the matter, much like Ash, Kit is still here. He isn't beholden to him by love, loyalty or charm. But he's still here. He still talks to Ash, even if most of their conversations devolve into thinly veiled threats and not-so-subtle resentful spats over their differences. Of which there are an unfortunate many.

There's also the matter of Ash being supremely out of his depth, being around someone who doesn't feel the need to care for him for once, and Kit seems to be the distrustful type, which suits him just fine.

Tactically speaking, though, however intriguing their existential arguments are, they're not liable to get anywhere if they continue like this. In fact, they're liable to kill each other first. So, Ash decides perhaps he should move his piece. A slight nudge. It is purely strategic. It has absolutely nothing to do with his genuine curiosity toward Kit and his juxtapositions.

So, during another round of "Who are you?" "I don't know, who are you?" When Kit mockingly, sarcastically plays his part, Ash answers honestly.

"My name is Ash." Just Ash. Not Ash Morgenstern, Sebastian's son or the Seelie Queen's offspring. Not Ash Morgenstern, who is to be the better Sebastian, as Janus wants. Not the boy who had his throat slit wide open by the king for a vial of blood, because there was power in him. None of that. Just Ash.

He thinks that, in this situation, it's easy to be just that.

Kit looks surprised, for a moment, and then a tad disarmed, and then wholly suspicious. And then, amusingly enough, he looks begrudgingly cowed.

Finally, in grumbling tones, he says, "Christopher."

It's odd, the way he says it. A bit dazed, a bit languid, and not at all deliberate. Like the simple honesty of it unfamiliar to him, rolling uncomfortably off his tongue. He says it in a mutter that could get lost in the soft twinkle of the woods and the gentle drizzle of the wind, were Ash not always keeping an ear open for everything Kit has to say, almost as studiously as Kit seems to listen to him, even when he pretends to ignore him.

The way Kit looks, he's surprised that's what came out. It takes Ash a moment to realize that perhaps it's not the name he usually goes by. Another moment to realize the raw vulnerability that crosses Kit's face for a moment, before he defiantly shuts it into boredom and distance, cockiness. Yet another, and he realizes that they're not all that dissimilar.

"It is a pleasure to meet you, then, Christopher," Ash says, going back to practicing runes on his ankle.

He means it.

Lake Lyn's water gives the fae "true sight" and allows them to see visions. It's poisonous to nephilim. For Ash and Kit, it's both.

How do they figure this out, you ask? They get thrown into Lake Lyn. They almost die. It is not fun.

They come out sputtering and hypothermic and also puking out half the river in the most disgraceful picture ever. For heirs to the throne, they look like wet, sick kittens.

And then they start going through the weirdest drug trip ever. Yes, they're running a very high fever. They're delirious. They're also half blind.

But they're seeing a lot of what's going to happen in the future and a lot of what happened in the past. They see their families, past and present and though there are glimpses of a future, it is...conspicuously hollow.

They see war and bloodshed and they see their allies turning on them. They see themselves alone and battered and broken.

Kit sees himself falling from the sky. It takes him a moment to realize he's got dark wings in the periphery of his vision and that there's iron netting burning along them, and that he...doesn't have wings.

It takes Ash a second to recognize Tessa Gray's face from Kit's dreams when he sees her, and then another to recognize the sword impaled inside his own chest, gilded gold and an inscription, a name—Cortana, it says Cortana—and yet another to see her tears and understand.

And then it's them, together, in Faeri, fighting against their worst enemies and their worst fears taken flesh—and they fight together. They wouldn't call each other friends, no, but they're not enemies, either, and they trust each other with their backs. Even though they should not. Even though they really should not.

If they're stuck with each other, they'll make sure they both make it out alive.

If only because they should be the ones to tear each other in half.

When Kit comes to, Ash has been dragging him through the woods of Idris, soaking wet and catatonic, while muttering under his breath in what he's halfway certain is a foreign language.

When he realizes Kit is awake, he asks, "What did you see?"

And all Kit can do is laugh so he doesn't cry. That seems to be answer enough for Ash.

(This is a particularly funny headcanon because before the parabatai ceremony aka the trial by fire, there's the trial by water. You know what it's about? You guessed it—you drink Lake Lyn's water together and see if your mind takes you to the same place, to fight to protect each other. Wonder what that’s about...)

Kit and Ash fight amazingly, instinctively well together. And guess what:

They hate it.

They despise it.

It's a little comical, really, and Kit's posse of ghostly friends is not shy about saying it. But Kit is so unamused. He is so unmoved.

After months and months of coiled tension, of barbed wire arguments, of hissing threats and very consciously turning away from each other to keep the peace, they understand each other. Somewhat.

They know each other's body language. Some of their tells. The way Kit's shoulders curl when he's wary. The way Ash's fingers give him away when they're too still or too twitchy, which is hard to tell apart from his general graceful stillness or his general twitching. (Not for Kit. That one's easy.)

And so, since they are both adept at seeing people's behavior and learning it, at seeing intentions through the language of the body, they fight like they've known each other for years.

Kit finds it so annoying that he could literally, physically scream. Ash just finds it confusing in a very 😐 way.

Where Kit wades in, Ash washes out. When Ash goes under, Kit aims higher. When Kit goes in, fast and lethal and up-close, Ash dances away, hard to catch and fluid as water.

Kit fights dirty; there's nothing fair or honorable about it. It's all speed and grace and clever movements, twin daggers slicing through tendons like butter, a swift leg kicking feet out from under people, dirt kicked into people's eyes and glasses smashed over their heads. He doesn't fight to win so much as he fights to survive, and so it's less about proving a point, about scoring, and more about making sure they can't get him. He's slick, slippering through grips like smoke, comfortable in the shadows, where he reigns king. He doesn't fight harder, he fights smarter.

Often, that means people find it distasteful, because he will manipulate and lie and brutalize his way out of a fight. He uses people's weakness against them the second he sniffs them out. He uses their anger, their sadness, their fear. Whatever he has to do, even if that's a knife to the back, even if that is something he'll hate himself for come morning.

Anything to survive. Anything to protect that which he loves. Anything to come back home.

Ash is of a mind with him. There's little he won't do to come out on top, whether it's lying or making false promises or biting his way through someone's carotid before they can slice through his own. In a fight, Kit is ruthless, but Ash is brutal. He blazes through every battle like it's his last. He fights to win, every single time, using every asset at his disposal to do so. He'll charm, he'll deceive, he'll be cruel, he'll be vicious, he'll be monstrous. He doesn't care; he's been entrusted with goals and dreams and expectations, and he'll meet each and every one.

(His father only ever said one or two things Ash actually found important. One of them was if I can't move heaven, I'll raise hell.)

(And here Ash is, huh.)

Ash has Jace's grace and Emma's strength, the same relentless grit, pushing and pushing until his opponent gives. He's got his mother's ease for figuring people out, for singling out the chinks in their armor. He's got his father's ease for exploiting them. He's a vision in the battlefield, wading his way through the chaos easily, never losing his cool and never tripping over his feet, dancing to a tune only he and few others seem to understand.

He's built for endurance and he's built for strength, but he's speedy in his own right and his instincts are impeccable. His reflexes, even more so. Plus, his wings are surprisingly vicious weapons and they move like an extension of himself, easy and fluid.

He's a warrior. A leader, even.

Kit, on the other hand, is built for speed more so than strength, even if he is strong. He's resilient and he endures. He doesn't give. And it's profoundly annoying, because he runs circles around the people he fights, slippery and clever. He ends things fast, either because he doesn't give his opponents a chance to make it otherwise or because he comes at them so sharply, so suddenly, they can't stop him, even when they know he's coming. When it drags on for longer, though, Kit fights a war of atrition, because his stamina is ridiculous. He has the time and the patience to pick at them and prod at the right places, so they'll get sloppy and give him an opening.

Kit's got that Herondale grace to him, beautiful and dangerous, but he also has the Carstairs patience, their ease. Their deliberation. He's got Tessa's quiet ferocity, her stubbornness. And he has his father's arrogance, that way he knew what buttons to push to get what he wanted.

If Ash moves like water, Kit moves like smoke, gone and then here again in a blink, pervasive and inevitable and fucking annoying. Pretty brutal, too, and often unfair.

Their signature weapons represent this, too.

(Thule's) Heosphoros, Morgenstern sword it is, cuts through everything like Ash's will. It strikes true and it strikes hard, relentless, and though it's smaller than its cousin, Phaesphoros, it's no less lethal. In Ash's hand, even a spoon would do the trick, but Heosphoros moves like it's a part of his arm, smooth and easy and beautiful.

And it could be the last thing you see, if that's what Ash wishes.

Kit's bichuwa daggers are curved, wickedly sharp things, older than anyone he knows is, except maybe Magnus. From the first time he holds them, they feel right in his hands, balanced in a way no weapon but the dagger Jace gave him has been. Dual wielding was daunting at first, unfamiliar and strange, but with time and training and help, it becomes as instinctive to him as breathing.

He's a menace with them, whirling through everything in his path like a cyclone of doom. They are versatile, adaptable weapons, though they're not for everyone. It takes a clever mind to adjust to them, takes a light step to wield them right. In Kit's hands, they're weapons of destruction and mercy tucked by his sides, ready to be drawn in a single flash that might be your last.

These two fighting styles, unsurprisingly, mesh very, very well.

It's easy. Instinctive. Pieces falling into place. Parallel lines. The push and pull of the waves taken physical shape, even with how wary they still are, even with all the damn walls. A game of smoke and mirrors taken flesh.

Nobody finds it more ??? than the Blackthorns, to be perfectly honest.

Tessa and Jem have...found feelings.

Mina likes it on sole account of thinking Ash is the coolest person ever outside of her family and Emma, because of his wings.

That annoys Kit even more, for the record, because he kinda gets where she's coming from.

Ash notices this. Kit doesn't want to be here anymore.

Kit's bichuwa daggers were once a part of Alastair's collection.

Once, Alastair resided in the home Kit and his family now live in. Now, Kit should technically know little of this; those are Carstair tales and the hurt of them is fresh for Jem, who would have given plenty of his ribs to help his family in their struggles if given the chance. Someday, he'll share. Until that day, they're all content to wait.

But the truth is that Kit knows things he doesn't want to know, things nobody should know. Because he sees things.

Kit's a Herondale. Herondales see more than the average person, even if that person is a nephilim. They see the living and the dead as though they were one and the same, the rules of the universe be damned. But Kit is fae, too, and there is more than enough of Auraline in him for him to see more than ghosts.

He sees the past, dreamily hazy and yet technicolor-like in its detail. Walking down the halls of Cirenworth, Kit can almost taste the past. Can hear Cordelia giggling and can see Alastair's tortured stoicism. He sees enough of them to know who they were, not as names but as people. He doesn't see enough to know exactly what happened to them, but he sees enough to think maybe he's okay with not knowing, with imagining they lived to be very happy.

But Oscar wasn't Cordelia's dog and he wasn't Alastair's, so what the hell was he doing here? How come Matthew Fairchild—the boy he saw when he held onto James's ring tightly enough, for that parabatai of his was as much a part of James as his own heart was—had somehow come to be here?

Or, if not Matthew, how come the dog he'd been so fond of ended up dying here?

Didn't make much sense, but Kit was learning quickly not to question the things he saw. Not the future and its chaos, the flames and the broken glass and the screams, and not the past, with its loss and its pain and its sepia mistakes.

So, when Oscar starts barking during Mina's first yuletide, Kit thinks nothing of it. Oscar is excitable and Kit is indulgent, given only he can hear him and Mina's naptime won't be disturbed. He pets him and plays with him and thinks nothing of the way he paces up and down one of the towers. It's not uncommon behavior. It shouldn't really raise any eyebrows.

Except it's been days and Oscar hasn't calmed down any. If anything, he's gotten more frantic. More pacing and more barking and a lot less sleeping for Kit.

So finally, Kit caves and follows the dog up to the top of the tower, with its roomy, dusty attic, sealed off and left for storage. It's a place Kit avoids, because the visions are particularly strong here. He suspects it has something to do with the imprints the past has left on the place. He really doesn't want to know if he's wrong or not.

But the lock gives easily with a couple shoves and a good picking, and Oscar rushes straight past him like a tornado, booking it toward the back of the room, avoiding all the piles of boxes and cases of weapons and white sheets protecting furniture from dust.

Kit follows wearily, blinking through the flashes of bleached hair and copper skin, hazel eyes and a fond smile. Love echoed through the walls like misery did, pulsing with loneliness and guilt and self-loathing as strongly as they did with affection; Kit could feel it like a physical touch, and he pulled down his long sleeves like that would ward off the way the echoes, words and sensations and memories, were already sinking into his bones.

But Oscar whined for his attention, sitting panting and waiting by the window, besides an ornate box caked in dust and half-hidden under a disturbed sheet. It's pure brass, shadowed by time but still swirling into beautiful patterns; it looks heavy, durable despite its beauty. Practical. And bigger than any jewelry box needed to be. Big enough it could be a gentleman's chest.

Kit blinked away the images of a past not his own, trying to forget the names to the faces—Alastair and Thomas, the voice in his head that wasn't his own whispered; Kit clenched his jaw—and followed Oscar, trailing fingers over his head, though he couldn't really touch him.

Here goes nothing, Kit thought, and then he unlatched the box.

And stared. And stared. And stared some more.

The first thing that strikes him as he stares down at the daggers is the violence of the recognition. The sheer familiarity. The certainty that yes, he's seen these somewhere before; he knows them, he's sure of it, in ways he hasn't ever been sure of much. He's seen them in the nebulous clouds of his visions, disjointed things that weren't dreams, that were memories nobody had yet or nobody had anymore.

The blades are twins, beautiful recurved, polished steel, glimmering even with the rust of time. The hilts were silver and brass, looping into knuckle-guards, ornamented elegantly with what looked like a small bird preparing to take flight. Guarding, almost. They lay on a bed of velvet, cared for, loved. There is power in them, dulled by time but waiting to blaze, and he can, at once, of their importance.

Same as he can tell, at once, that they're Carstairs blades. It's not in any signature he can see. Or in any ornament. No castle tower and no resemblance to Cortana beyond the wickedness of the blade's edge. Nothing to explain what he knew.

Nothing except memories, that is, and Alastair Carstairs's presence deep within the foundations of Cirenworth. There was no ghost of him. He was, at least in death, free. But Kit could feel him still, could feel the imprint he'd left here, heavy with conflict and a maelstrom of emotions, filled with abrasive longing.

He had a collection of daggers, Kit remembered abruptly. A great many of them, a whole slew of them, scattered throughout the world and the house, now. And it looked like Oscar had found one such pair for Kit.

"Good boy," Kit says, before he reapplies his Strength rune and heaves the chest into his arms.

As it turns out, Jem is none the wiser about these particular daggers. He doesn't recognize them, though he, too, is certain they belonged to Alastair. Tessa is slightly less clueless; as it turns out, they had belonged to Alastair, once upon a Tuesday. They were ancient, really, bichuwa daggers from the 17th century, one of Alastair's greatest findings and dearest treasures. They were Cordelia's favorites, apparently, or at least the ones that actually called to her eye.

And so, Alastair had apparently surrendered the daggers as a wedding gift, handed to his sister for safekeeping, so they would one day belong to a Herondale. As a gift. Since it was what made her happy.

"Did that happen?" Kit asked, even as he felt the answer in the drop of his stomach.

Tessa's smile crumpled, and that was answer enough.

Afterwards, they discuss what to do. Return them to the tower? Treasure them? Have them as family weapons along with Cortana? Save them for Mina, in case that she one day chooses to be a Shadowhunter, so a Carstairs can wield them?

They get nowhere.

Until Jem says, gentle in the way he always is to Kit, "Whatever the reason, they were meant for a Herondale."

Kit denies it vehemently, at first. He couldn't possibly. But Tessa softly adds that he was led to them, that he recognized them, that they are familiar to him. That he is a Herondale, their Herondale.

And that he is as much a Carstairs as he is a Herondale, because he is as much their son as Mina is their daughter, and—

And there's really not much Kit can say to that without breaking into tears, so he gives up and gives in, and sits down to polish the blades with Jem while Tessa puts on the tea.

(They are runed. Primed for the usage. They renew them, of course, after they've been polished and cleaned and sharpened back to their former glory, gleaming steel and a wicked edge to it. Merciless and vicious, and beautifully so.)

(They feel perfectly balanced in Kit's hands, the cold under his fingertips familiar and comforting, grounding. He thinks, as he settles his grip, that he could get used to this.)

(He looks up to smile at Jem, excited and bashful, and catches the melancholy gleam in his eye, the affection of his grin. And he finds that yes, these belong to him.)

The daggers:

Ash has the typical dramatic fae speech. Kit has the typical Herondale speech. Immovable object meets unstoppable force.

Banter. So much banter. So much bickering. They are a nightmare to be around.

Nobody can tell if they literally despise each other or would take a bullet for each other.

To be perfectly honest they don't know either and they have absolutely no desire to figure it out

Ash speaks like he came out of a damn Shakespeare play. Waxes poetry about everything. The perfect Victorian gentleman.

He speaks like Matthew and Will, okay. But like. With an indubitably straight face. All the fucking time.

It drives Kit up the wall.

(He doesn't know this, but that makes Ash get worse.)

Kit speaks like God mixed sarcasm, drama, and a fair bit of withering, scathing remarks into a bottle and then forgot to measure out the angst and the insults.

He speaks Herondale, is what he speaks.

Ash is somehow unperturbed.

(It drives him up the wall, too, but bold of you to assume he'd admit that on pain of death.)

By the time TWP begins, Kit can make bargains like the fae. Binding ones.

Not that he...actually knows this.

Yet another instance where the use of his abilities is purely instinctive.

They're in a pinch and he can't girlboss gaslight gatekeep his way outta this one, so he does the next best thing.

Bargaining.

"Let's make a deal," he tells the fae about to kill them all, and the asshole, predictably, pauses. Trust a fae to give into intrigue.

The fun bit comes when, once the deal is done with, the fae can't actually go back on it, both because they're a fae and because neither can Kit.

Subconsciously, he tied all his loose ends pretty tight, and the deal is exactly as he wants it to be.

And he keeps doing this. Over and over. Without fucking realizing.

Until one day he makes a deal with Dru of all people and then they find themselves in a bit of a situation when they realize neither of them can actually, like. Go back on it as they'd secretly planned to.

(Ash finds it hysterical. Kit can tell because his mouth twitched and his eyes darkened with amusement. Bastard.)

In the same vein, any type of promise, oath or vow between Kit and Ash is a mess. The world could literally end and the vow would still fucking stand.

This is how Ash ends up justifying giving a fuck about Kit to himself and the world, going all, "I am protecting my investment," in true antagonist-going-through-an-arc nature. Typical.

(Yes, this would subsequently turn into those “what do you mean, christopher is dying??? he made me a promise, how dare that utter nincompop—” “ASH WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING” “this is his own fault, really, he should have considered his options better before making promises with the fae”)

(This is particularly and spectacularly ridiculous because the promise was probably something along the lines of “hey, tell you what, if we make it out of this one alive, I’ll take you around the world myself” and now Ash is ready to conduct open heart surgery in the middle of a war In The Name of The Unbreakable Vow)

(Dru voice: They are idiots, your honor.)

Kit steals things from Ash to see how long it'll take him to realize they're gone.

It's a game they play

Except only Kit knows about it

It's a vindictive sort of pleasure at first, a purely spite-driven quest to chip away at Ash's sanity and glacier composure

Then it becomes a game

Ash is not amused.

Dru is.

She really, really is.

(Ash calls him sticky fingers and Kit just raises an eyebrow and goes, “I’m surprised you even knew that was a thing” and then they’re off again)

Kit lets Ash practice runes on him.

It's a really weird experience

Their relationship, if it can even be called that, has so many vitriolic layers of danger and tension and "I may or may not be the one to kill you one these days (real)" going on that it feels...oddly diminutive, comparatively

He's willingly—well, as willing as you can be when your freaky fae magic literally hauls you both into the woods in the middle of the night and you're still not entirely sure you're not actually there—sat by Ash's side for months now, discussing the most philosophical of things but not even knowing if he has a favorite meal. They've skipped rocks and they've hissed at each other because they’re seemingly not the yelling type and they've taken walks through the woods and one time Kit shoved Ash in a lake for no reason other than he could. They've told each other deep dark secrets under the guise of using them as weaponry. They've made each other vulnerable while being acutely aware that they're dangerous

Point is, they've kinda jumped the gun on this one. Sure, Kit doesn't even know Ash's birthday, but he does know what he'd kill and die for and that these things only align on the loosest of terms. Ash has no idea if Kit likes mangoes, but he does know what he hates and who he loves, and in the grand scheme of things, he thinks that kind of counts for more

Which is why, as Kit watches Ash practice the same runes on his foot over and over again, his skin sizzling softly, getting pinker and redder until the skin is burnt and blistered and the runes are still sloppy, still fading, he feels a profound level of annoyance

One that aligns almost perfectly with the tinge of concern in the back of his mind

Finally, with a long-suffering sigh, he snatches a hand around Ash's wrist. It's difficult to do, like threading through water, but he does it.

The skin under his hand is cold, not as much of that of the vampires that he has met, not as much as coming into contact with the shadow of a ghost, but enough that it would raise brows. It’s spring in Faeri now. His skin should be warm and clammy, like Kit’s, except it never is. Even when it snows, there’s no flush to his cheeks, no redness to his skin. There never is, unless he’s injured, which happens rarely enough that it’s a stele-only affair. Speaking of.

The pulse under Kit’s fingertips is strong and fast and steady, like nephilim pulses often are. It's faster than usual, though, hummingbird wings, a bit like Mina's. Except Mina's is slower, not faster, just like Tessa's. Tessa's is slowest, back home. Languid, almost. It took Kit a long time to realize his own pulse was weird like that, like Mina's, all smooth, dripping syrup, almost bored in its pace.

He thinks that's probably because he spent so much of his life ready to bolt at a moment's notice that he never knew what a resting pulse was until very, very recently.

He knows this is Ash's resting pulse, though, because it's not the first time he feels it. He even catches snatches of it sometimes, when he's in his dreams, like he's got an ear pressed right against his chest.

It doesn't jump at all with the contact. Just like it hadn't lurched with the pain. If anything, he looks a tad confused, in that wary, tense way they have around each other. Kit suspects his touch is more painful than the stele's persistent burn is, because touching each other is hard. It's like pushing through layers of power, through barriers standing between them, even though they can't see them.

Even so, Kit squeezes, tight enough to bruise the pale skin under his fingertips, to dig his nails in, pressing down on veins and capillaries, harshly enough for Ash's fingers to cease all movement, stele stuttering in place as smoke wafts gently from his flesh.

"Do me," Kit says, very slowly, very deliberately, a lick of an accent beginning to chase his words.

(Years in Devon will do that to you, he supposes.)

Ash doesn't really give any reaction between a momentary, curious smolder to his eyes, the beginning of a twitching brow that smooths out fast enough that anybody could chalk it up to their imagination. Kit doesn't. Kit knows. Kit waits.

Until Ash nods, decisive but subdued, because he always seems decisive but subdued, quiet and observant and dangerous by very nature, misleading in the delicacy of his bone structure and the demure look to his lashes, even though all his grace is coiled lethality.

The point is. He nods. And so Kit slowly, slowly lets go, working his jaw to contain a flinch at the shudder that works its way down his skin as he pulls back, threading through the heat of the water again, fingers squeezing reflexively. It doesn't hurt, not quite, but there's pressure to it, and it isn't comfortable.

(It gets easier the longer they touch, but boy will it take them a long time to fucking realize)

(When they do realize it, though, it's a gradual, conscious effort to ease their way through the current of pressure between them. They greet each other with small, careful touches, softening their way through it. Shaking hands for the fuck of it when they see each other. Bumping shoulders together. Brushing hands when exchanging things.)

(Eventually, it becomes easy to bear what becomes a moment of pressure. It's just a moment's pause, easy to adjust to, and though it's certainly not normal, it is for them. It's good enough.)

Ash reaches out and grabs Kit's wrist this time, his graceful fingers a little too stiff as they break through and cradle Kit's bone. He turns it over, slowly, the buzz spreading, the pressure aching. And then he begins pressing down his stele, making graceful shapes over shifting tendons and bumpy veins.

It happens many, many more times.

When Janus said it would be painful for Ash to bear runes, he didn't mean it in the normal way.

He didn't mean it in the "runes are generally painful, especially for newbies, buckle up" way.

He meant it in the "You have demon blood. This will be very difficult for you. It will hurt inmmensely. Buckle the fuck up" way.

Which, he was right, for the record.

“But Lucie and James also have demon blood and they’re doing just fine!” You might say. To which I’d respond that Tessa and Sebastian are drastically different examples of people with demon blood. Not to mention Ash has the blood of Lilith running through his veins. Lilith.

Also Ash is a freaking faerie, too, he and Kit are literally both one of a kind and my entire point is that I will die on this hill until Cassandra Clare herself comes and inevitably proves me wrong via The Wicked Powers. It’s okay. I know it’s coming

But until then.

It actually is physically painful for Ash to bear runes, especially at the beginning. He’d been trained as a warrior for most of his life, yes, and he was exceptionally good at it, but. Runes were, he soon learned, different.

Runes didn't come naturally to him in the least. Not like everything else had. It was harder for him to draw them than it ought to be. More painful, too, as they sizzled and burned their way into his body, leaving behind welts and red, blotchy skin. He'd seen the runes on Janus's skin, had seen how they were drawn upon it, and much as he tried to replicate them on his own, they didn't stick.

It bothered him. Constant practice was the only means to achieve perfection, of course, and so he would sit down with his stele for hours, pressing down as hard as he could, trying to sear the mark into his body.

It worked, little by little. The simpler runes began to stick, began to work. At a price, of course.

Namely, the pulses of pain that spread from the mark and throughout his entire body, chronic and sporadic and unstoppable. Apparently, some people were resistant to Marks. Apparently, Ash was one of them. For a variety of reasons.

Janus theorized as Ash came down with a fever when he got his first mark—Strength, of course—that it was a mix of resistance and his demon blood, plus the fae blood. It was like throwing a match in a powder keg and hoping for the best.

Ash pulled through, of course. Whether he would or not was never even a question. And as soon as he did, he began training again. That was never a question, either.

Janus wanted to give him the world, after all.

(The more permanent and powerful the rune, the greater the pain. The Voyance rune is agonizing to obtain under normal circumstances. For Ash, it's torture, fiery pain and tremors and firecrackers bursting through his spine. It's his skin peeling and itching, flushed and pallid by turns. It's the way he feels his entire body has been beaten black and blue, leaving him feverish and then boneless, hazy and disoriented.)

(It gets better. With time and practice and effort. Part of it is Ash getting adjusted, both to the pain and the sensation. Part of it is his body getting adjusted, striking a tentative and tenuous balance. Most of it, he thinks, is his will and his blood winning out over the part of him that belonged to his father.)

(He still practices frantically, though, both on his skin and Kit's, tracing all sorts of runes over their arms and legs and hips. Kit starts asking him for runes he needs, which is a tacit offering, an olive branch of sorts. Kinder than they usually are to each other. And hesitantly, against his better judgement, Ash always acquiesces.)

(He practices and practices and practices until finally his marks are perfect and elegant and looping over his porcelain skin, easy sprawls inked into him. They still hurt more than they probably ought to, but that's alright. Ash doesn't really mind pain or hurt anymore.)

(He's too familiar with it to care much.)

Ash has unusually sharp hearing (and a good nose).

Though less so than a full-blooded faerie like, say, Kieran, Ash has very keen ears. Better than most half-fae's, even, which is probably due to his mother being the Seelie Queen.

He's also got a very good nose, though not nearly as great as a downwolder's ought to be. Good enough to pick specific scents out, though, even complex ones.

Kit smells like summer to him. Summer rain and tarts, a tang of citrus and the bite of salt, either sweat or sea spray. Traces of sugar, caramel. He smells pleasant, headily so. Except when he's upset and his scent blazes into something charred and radioactive, utterly intoxicating.

Ash himself smells like snow and vanilla, the rust of blood of his father and his mother's dead flowers born anew, into the scent of a fresh bouquet. There's something subtle to it, enticing, almost enough to forget the bittersweet draw of Lilith's blood, licorice and tears and decay.

Ash and Kit are both faetally beautiful.

See what I did there? Faetally? Ey? No? Okay.

On a more serious note—Ash is gorgeous in the way porcelain is. He's enticing, meant to draw you in, even if he'll be your doom. He is, much like his mother, devastating.

Kit has always had startling eyes, the kind that command attention, that make people stare a bit too long. The kind of cheekbones that arch delicately and beautifully. The kind of plush mouth others cannot help but want to kiss.

And as he grows older, the appeal grows significantly stronger.

The fae blood in him is no joke. It strengthens as he comes of age, as his hair becomes spun gold upon his head, turns to aureate cascades under the light of the sun. As his eyes become the lighthouse that people would swim miles in the dark toward, just for the chance of taking a peak.

His mouth is tantalizing, his mole is inspiring, his freckles are constellations and his face is a work of art. It's Greek beauty, powerful and tragic and absolutely arresting.

It knocks people off their feet and onto their ass. It's charming and it's more than a little magic, too, enough that it takes some getting used to.

(Enough that, sometimes, Kit doesn't give them the time to.)

Tessa thinks Ash is a ghost.

Kit is a secretive, broody Herondale who keeps broody Herondale secrets. This is true. Even when he isn’t actively hiding things, he isn’t exactly forthcoming about them, because he doesn’t really think anybody cares (Tessa and Jem will change this, just you fucking wait)

But Kit is also a severely sleep deprived teenager who has night terrors and a very curious, very adorable little sister. Kit is that one brother who has to close his eyes because if he looks at Mina making puppy dog eyes, he’s caving

All this to say, when Mina wakes him up one day—she does this by jumping on his bed laughing and shrieking every other day—he blurts out Ash’s name instinctively.

He’s still in that in-between state, halfway under water and halfway gasping for air and pulling oxygen back into his lungs. When he’s like this, the real world and the one he sees every other night when he goes to sleep blend into a watercolor floor, into a vibrant haze. There’s Ash laying on a bed of roses and lilies, dandelions bursting through his hair, his eyes shut for once. 

(A very stubborn and deliberate way of telling Kit that he’ll always take the first step if he has to. Even if for all his forced nonchalance, arms folded behind his head, which is tipped back languidly, there are veins bulging at his runed forearms, popping at his neck. His pulse is over two beats faster than usual, and Kit can tell because he can see it jumping at his neck. His fingers are so still that stiff doesn’t even begin to describe it. His eyes keep moving behind his pale, bruised lids.)

(The strategy costs him.)

(But Kit does lay by his side, watching the way he reacts to the shifting of the blades of grass, or the sound of Kit shuffling in place, or the wind. Watching him deliberately not react to any of that, which is a reaction in and of itself to Kit’s trained eyes. Watching him letting himself be watched by not watching back.)

And then there’s Ash’s mouth twitching into that smile, mischievous and smug at once, a little pleased. He accomplished something by staying still all this time, leaving himself vulnerable, even if it was only an illusion. And he knows it.

And then there’s Mina curling into his side, giggling as she hides under his covers, like Jem won’t come lovingly drag them both out of bed by the scruff of the neck if he has to.

And there’s Kit muttering Ash’s name as their world fades into his own, and Mina scurries out of the blanket to blink dark, curious eyes at him.

“Ash?” she asks slowly, mouth clumsy around the new word, grin spreading in toothy delight when she sees that she got it right.

Kit ruffles her hair, watching her make a valiant attempt to flee with a shriek, and then says, because he can’t deny her anything, “He’s...a friend. One of the ones only I can see. Like Oscar.”

Not entirely true, but not entirely a lie, either. Enough of both to land on its feet, anyway.

Mina considers this for a moment, perched atop Kit’s chest like the world’s smallest queen, and then she nods decisively like that is very fair indeed. And that’s the end of that, as Kit snatches her around the waist and off the bed with him, her laughter filling the halls along with the smell of tea and coffee.

Little does our little Kitty know that Mina tells Tessa all about Ash—well, as much as a child who’s been speaking for all of 9 months can—very innocently.

Tessa pales a little at the mention of friends that only Kit can see, because her children do not have a good history with keeping ghostly friendships strictly friendly. In fact, they fucking suck at it and Tessa is going to have nightmares about the Jesse Situation for the rest of her prolonged existence.

But she decides to trust the process and trust Kit, most of all, because her boy may be a secretive, broody Herondale, but he’s still her boy. And she must trust that, if he does need her help or if he is, indeed, making his own Jesse Situation—Tessa might cave and turn to drink if she has to create mental folders for the Ash Situation, she really might—he will come to her. Eventually. Hopefully.

So for now, she kisses Mina’s forehead and says, “Ash sounds delightful, dear.”

(So imagine her surprise when, years down the line, she meets Ash and he’s a) decidedly alive, b) Sebastian Morgenstern’s son with the Seelie Queen, c) very attached to Janus The Serial Killer and d) Kit knew at least half of this. Kit knew him this entire time. Kit has known Ash Morgenstern for years and he never thought to mention it to any of them.)

(Fuck it, she might turn to drink anyway.)

(...At least it’s not another Jesse Situation?)

(No. No, it is not. It’s the first of many Ash Situations. Plural.)

(Will help them all wherever he is, because Tessa and Jem have their work cut out for them. And Clary, too. Hoot, hoot.)

Kit gives Ash his Enkeli rune.

I hear your skepticism, I do. But worry not. There are Reasons behind this.

Obviously, none of what happens in their dreams, short of them actually...dying—they haven’t tried that one yet—actually carries over to the waking world. Otherwise, they’d have a bit of a huge problem trying to keep their respective dream partner secret from everyone else.

Hence, when an actual conversation—a civil one! One that wasn't even dreary!—takes place, glossing over a lot of factors to keep the peace, Ash mentions that he doesn't have the Enkeli rune yet.

It's permanent, after all. Same as the Voyance rune. And he's mildly avoiding permanent runes, given how much they take out of him while he adjusts—not that he'll ever admit to this.

Nevertheless, in the silence that follows, broken solely by the creek gently singing a few feet away from the patches of grass and wildflowers where they sit, Kit says, "Want me to draw it for you?"

There's forced levity to his voice, injecting nonchalance into the statement violently, like that can change its meaning or its impact or maybe the hesitation and deliberation that must have undoubtedly preceded it. It's another one of their careful side-steps around the truth, which is that they shouldn't be what they are to each other, whatever that is.

And Ash smoothly offering up a wrist, the picture of trust and compliance, is an acceptance that they are something. And that they'll figure out what to do with that later.

Ash's fingers are lax and graceful, forceful relaxation, a point being made. His veins glimmer like currents of watercolor over the delicate bones of his wrists, vulnerable under the thin film of his pale skin. Kit's hand moves to cradle it before he's made up his mind to, slow and careful, pushing through the pressure with as much ease as he can pretend to.

It's his left wrist, bare and rid of the raised silvery lines of faded Marks, his pulse a steady rise and fall as Kit digs his stele out of his pocket. He thinks about his own Enkeli, resting over the pulse pounding at his right wrist, and wonders whether it was purposeful. If it was deliberate.

He thinks it's better if he doesn't know and presses stele to skin, watching it sizzle and burn, like it's a brand he's pressing over Ash's bird bones.

By the time he's done completing familiar, simple lines, something in Ash has changed. A slight lurch to his shoulders, a tightness to the line of his crossed legs, a vein popping at his forearm insistently. It's subtle, small, negligible.

Kit knows better than to disregard it.

His alert gaze has gone hooded, though it grows sharper in compensation, even as the smoke disperses gently, even as there is a flicker of something in the corner of his mouth. It looks uncomfortable. Kit wants to know what it is.

But he knows better than to ask and so he says, "Now you have one," and tucks his stele behind his ear, and holds out a winning smile.

Ash takes the out for what it is, and smiles back, a thing full of mockery and irony. Even so, he doesn't tug his wrist away. In fact, he hardly seems to breathe at all until Kit lets go, feeling the pins and needles sensation linger.

(When Ash wakes up, the black angles are gone, his skin bare and unblemished, the feverish haze of pain absent.)

(When he meets Janus for training later that day, the lines are back and they're there to stay.)

Just some general runes they have.

Kit has a Calm Anger rune on his right hip-bone. After Kit explains in detail how his powers awakened and, more specifically, the why, Jem suggests that the Calm Anger rune might be helpful. It's not a cure; after all, Kit doesn't need curing. But it's a crutch of sorts while he learns to hone and control his abilities, so he won't give himself away or hurt others.

(He reapplies it very, very often. Better safe than sorry.)

Both he and Ash have Mnemosyne runes, for similar reasons. They both had excellent memories to begin with, nothing and filing away pretty much everything they saw or heard. The runes just expanded on something that already existed.

(Kit started out with an Eidetic Memory rune; he didn't ever want to forget his time with Tessa and Jem, or Mina's childhood, for one. But for another, he also didn't want to forget the Blackthorns, even if it was masochistic and unbearable to remember them more often than not. When he realized he was forgetting his father, though, no matter how hard he tried to remember him, because he'd still been his father—Kit drew upon himself the Mnemosyne. Permanent and reliable. Painful, too, but worth it.)

(It just so happens his visions went from what could be waved away as bad dreams to more, too much, shortly thereafter. Irony.)

(The rune is under his right collarbone.)

(Ash, on the other hand, went straight for the Mnemosyne. There were too many things he needed to remember with as startling a clarity as he possibly could. He lived in the Faerilands, surrounded by deceit and bloodthirst; he was going to have the world, sooner rather than later; and, whatever anyone said, he was his parents' son. He couldn't afford to fumble.)

(Thus, as permanent a remembrance as he could find it was.)

(Ash's Mnemosyne is on the inside of his left bicep.)

Kit got his Enkeli rune from Jem after a couple of months of training, drawn upon the inside of his right wrist. (Ash's being on the inside of his left wrist. Ahem.)

Ash has a permanent Strength rune swirling on the outside of his right forearm.

Kit prefers the more temporary ones, which he often inlays over spots of his arms, most notably his biceps.

Janus was the one to draw Ash's Agility rune on him, early on in his training. It's on Ash's right shoulder blade.

(Kit's was given to him by Tessa, and it's on the left side of his ribs.)

Kit has a Flexibility rune on the crevice between his left hip and thigh.

Kit has the Equilibrium rune right under the crook of his right elbow. He acquired it after Jem planted him into the floor for the seventh time in a row via knocking him off balance. Kit will die mad about it taking several weeks for Jem to mention its existence.

(Ash got his briefly after he got his Agility rune. It made him even more of a pain to deal with than he already was, given his incredible ability with hand-to-hand and unshakeable core strength. It's on his right bicep.)

Ash applies Fortitude runes on the line of his left shoulder.

(Kit tends to go for his sides or the inside of his arms.)

Kit's Speed rune is on the line of his left shoulder, and he always applies it on the same place once it fades, comforted by the habitual familiarity.

(Ash's runs along the length of his right collarbone.)

When a Foresight rune is required, Kit usually puts it along the veins on the inside of one of his forearms.

(Ash places them along his left hip-bone.)

Ash's Stamina rune is on the side of his throat.

(Kit's is on the right side of his breast, over his lung.)

Kit has a Speak in Tongues rune curling around the back of his left ear.

(The Herondales in his memories speak Welsh often enough that he'd go mad without it. That's without mentioning all the Persian whispers in these halls. And, besides, Jem speaks in Mandarin often enough for Mina to get accustomed to it. Until Kit somewhat grasps the language, which he intends to do, the rune will do.)

They are both right-handed, thus their Voyance runes are on the back of their hands.

These are, of course, just some of their runes. But I wanted to write it down.

Now, onto goofier things:

Ash is the taller one of the two.

In a funny twist of fate, Kit is still smaller than his companion

Ash is quite tall. At least as tall as Alec, without a doubt. And he's got broad shoulders to go with it, too, which makes him look taller.

(Kit is lithe and lean where Ash is broad and firm. Nevertheless, they are both the picture of statuesque beauty.)

Kit, who is smaller than Jace, nevermind Ash, will die mad about this.

At least he knows for a fact that, even though Ash is also physically stronger, Kit can carry his entire weight, wings and all, with no problem at all.

(Don't ask.)

Kit makes fun of Ash's circlets.

Especially the bejeweled one in Ash's latest flower card.

He also steals it more than once, which is honestly as impressive as it is befuddling.

Kit has his ears pierced.

He got them pierced for his seventeenth birthday, as a present from his then friend and now girlfriend.

She got a septum, which Kit had a lot to tell Tessa about. (It takes him weeks to realize he's crushing. Tessa stares into the camera like she's in The Office all the while.)

He gets both his lobes pierced, a double helix and a daith in one ear and a tragus and conch in the other, because he's a Herondale. Go big or go home!!

(Thank fuck for iratzes because Kit should've really, really gone home. Tessa is disappointed but not surprised in the least. Jem is honestly not even disappointed; he'd expected this.)

On the same vein:

Kit paints his nails.

Usually, he goes for dark colors, like blacks, purples and blues.

Occasionally, he goes for more colorful stuff, especially when Mina suggests it.

Funnily enough, the polish is almost always chipped, despite Tessa painting them for him weekly.

(He bites and peels at them, or ruins them during training, picks at them when he isn't twisting and turning at his ring. Either way, they're chipped more often than not.)

(It's a quirk she's very, very fond of.)

(Especially because it reminds her of Lucie, with her ink-stained fingertips, and James, with the ring he never left alone. The ring that hadn't belonged to him for a time, given away to the only person to hold his heart in its totality aside from Cordelia, before it did belong to him once again, a melancholy reminder, and then it belonged to her.)