#pre malec

The next page is just Dad, a three-quarter view Max had scribbled out right after Dad had gotten home from Idris. It's all black and white, tones of gray shading around his face. The only color on this page is in Dad's eyes, the bright, piercing blue Max can never get down on paper no matter how hard he tries. (Could never, a part of his mind whispers. Past tense, 'cause you know you'll never see Dad again.)

And then he's crying, silently, heaving into his blankets and muffling the sobs that threaten to rip into the quiet surrounding him, because Max is eight, and he's never going to see his dad again and even though Magnus and Ms. Cat are both amazing, and he loves being able to learn about his magic and likes hanging out with Madzie and Althor and Greg, he wants his dad. He wants to be able to laugh, to smile and live, but he misses his dad and Aunt Izzy and Uncle Jace and Grampa Isaiah and the stone walls of the Institute, the kitchen where he and Dad had spent late nights and early mornings, misses the smell of empanadas and Dad's hands guiding his forms and sparring with Uncle Jace and getting knocked on his ass butt and tracing his family's runes. Misses the burnt hot chocolate Aunt Izzy would make him, misses laughing from his heart when Dad found out and yelled at her.

Misses being happy.

This is his weekly ritual, pulling out the sketchbook he tucked away and flipping through it and thinking of lost opportunity. But Raziel, how the eight-year-old ached for his father's touch. Max tucks the sketchbook away, pushing the floorboard back into place.

A mourning band.

Max remembers asking Dad about the black band on some of the Institute's Shadowhunters' skin.

Dad had told him that it was because they'd lost someone close to them, and they wanted to tell other people to not mention it, and because they were grieving for their lost family.

And-

And now Dad is wearing one, on his skin, and Max knows, sure as he knows that his name is Max Lightwood and his Dad is the best man he knows, Max knows that the mourning band is for him.

He throws open his window, pushes his magic out and away, the one spell he knows, and thank the Angel that his dad answers.

That night, he sneaks out.

He steps silent and careful, quiet in the way only Shadowhunters can be, because he was raised by one and taught the things every nephilim child learns. He stumbles to a halt, rocking on his heels anxiously. Watches the treeline. Someone appears, a familiar gait making itself known to the desperate boy, and he watches the stele move through the air, come to rest on the Shadowhunter's arm, before a rune fades and the Shadowhunter's face snaps into view,a nd Max's eyes blur with tears and he launches himself at his dad with a sob.

"Papa-!" A ragged call, tearing itself out of his throat, and Max leaps for Dad. Dad runs toward him, catching him like Max knew he would, and collapsing onto the ground. Max can feel his tears, and he presses himself closer to Dad, hoping beyond all hope that the past few months have just been a bad dream, and he'll wake up in his dad's bed like he always has after a nightmare. "Papa." Max whispered, feeling Dad's arms tighten around him briefly.

Dad is pressing desperate kisses to Max's forehead, and it takes a long time for them to pull apart, but Max just can't, and it takes another thirty minutes before he can sit up and look at his dad.