Wow! This is my first upload in years. I honestly never thought that I'd be publishing stories again, but after reading City of Lost Souls tonight, I just couldn't help myself. If you've read it, you'll know why. I apologize for any spelling/grammatical errors, but I only finished reading the book just over an hour ago!
WARNING: Contains spoilers for City of Lost Souls
DISCLAIMER: The Mortal Instruments series is the property of the wonderful Cassandra Clare, who I hope is planning to make up for the tragic ending of CoLS...

...

"'I'll be out all day,' Magnus said. 'Come and get your things out of the apartment. Leave your key on the dining room table.' His eyes searched Alec's face. 'It's over. I don't want to see you again, Alec. Or any of your friends. I'm tired of being their pet warlock.'" (CoLS, page 509-510)

In his eight hundred years of existence, Magnus had never quite realized what loneliness was like until this moment. He had been rejected and cast out by his parents when he was still a child, had witnessed many people come and go in his life, but nothing had ever hurt him quite like this.

He had never loved anyone as he had loved Alec, and thus no one else had ever been capable of hurting him in the way that Alec had.

Eight hundred years of knowledge could not provide Magnus with an accurate description of his current suffering. There were no words in this language or any other that could capture the total anger and betrayal that he'd felt as he'd followed Alec to the abandoned subway station.

Alec had called it a mistake, had apologized over and over again, but Magnus had hardly heard a word of it. He was still trying to wrap his head around the fact that Alec, vulnerable and loveable Alec, had gone behind his back and betrayed him to Camille. It was absurd, it was impossible, and yet it had happened.

Alec had been jealous of Camille, had hated her for having met Magnus first, and yet he had still sought a pact with her in order to strip Magnus of his immortality.
Magnus remembered once saying that Alec was different from the other Lightwoods. Bitter laughter filled the loft, ricocheting off of the walls and causing Chairman Meow to shoot under a nearby chair in fear. How stupid he had been! In the end, Alec was exactly like the other Lightwoods: cold, calculating, ruthless, Shadowhunter. The word had a bitter ring to it, even in his mind.

His reverie was interrupted by the harsh ringing of his cellphone. Magnus glared at the offensive object, blue sparks dancing threateningly at his fingertips. He was tempted to shred the phone into a thousand metal pieces, littering the hardwood floors with them like confetti. It was a shame that his phone was so integral to his line of work. He wearily glanced at Chairman Meow, whose head was poking out from under the chair.

"Are you going to get that?" Chairman Meow only blinked in response. Even he seemed to be in a more somber mood than usual, as if he could sense that something cataclysmic had just occurred.

Magnus dragged himself off of the couch and over to his phone, which he had thrown across the room a few hours ago in a moment of rage. He gingerly picked it up off of the floor.

The name on the display was ISABELLE LIGHTWOOD.

Magnus's eyes narrowed dangerously. He was strongly tempted to throw the phone back to the ground and stomp on it for good measure. Instead he hit the ignore button.

He wasn't exactly surprised that she was phoning. Isabelle had always made it very clear that she would come after him if he ever hurt her brother. He wasn't sure what Al- what the Shadowhunter had told her, but he was sure that she would've come after him regardless. If anything, he was a bit surprised that she wasn't breaking down his door, pitchfork (or at the very least a fashionable-yet-deadly whip) in hand.

The apartment seemed oppressively silent in the moments following Isabelle's call. Magnus sunk back onto the couch, phone still in hand. He had a feeling that she wouldn't give up so easily, and decided to place additional wards around the apartment to prevent intruders. He would also need to disable the buzzer, and perhaps install a new lock.

Magnus's eyes creased. It had been over sixteen hours since he had walked away from Alexander, and the boy had yet to show his face at the loft. Magnus had avoided the building like the plague all day. He hadn't really had anything to do, of course, but he hadn't wanted to be here when Alec stopped by. He'd tortured himself all day with wondering whether or not Alec had been to apartment yet. He had debated going home around three, but decided to wait a few more hours for safe measure. It was past ten o'clock when he had finally returned home. By that time, the city lights had burst to life, twinkling in the night like a thousand tiny stars.

Magnus wasn't exactly sure what he had expected to find when he came home (the scenario had been replaying itself in his mind all day like an ever-shifting nightmare), but what he hadn't expected was to find no sign of a key on the dining room table, or the kitchen counter, or any other surface of the apartment. In fact, the rooms had remained untouched since that morning, the bed sheets still in disarray from when Magnus had sprung out of bed earlier that morning to trail Alexander. Alec's clothes were still in the bedroom, his toothbrush still in the bathroom.

Every object that Alec had ever touched or used now felt like a bullet to Magnus's chest.

In an act of frustration, he had gathered everything that reminded him of Alec, including all of the boy's possessions, and shoved them in a box which he placed just outside the front door. Ironically enough, he had noticed his downstairs neighbour do the exact same thing only a week or two ago. After this, Magnus replaced all of the furniture in his loft (which had been decorated with a neo-Victorian flair) with new pieces. Bright. Leather. Rainbow. Everything that was opposite to Alexander Lightwood. When he was finished, there was no longer any black or blue in the apartment. Those colours reminded him too much of Alexander, and too much of the colours of his own battered heart.

If Magnus had thought that this cleansing would help the healing process, he was wrong. The apartment seemed wrong now, somehow, as if it wasn't quite complete without the little touches that Alec had brought to it. Magnus wondered how one boy had managed to affect his life so deeply in such a short span of time. Their few short months together were nothing more than a blink of an eye to an immortal warlock, but yet they seemed to have stretched on for an eternity in themselves. Alec had been everything to Magnus: past, present, and future. Well, maybe not past, but when Alec was around it was hard for Magnus to remember that there had ever been a time before him. Alec was here, Alec was now, and Alec was forever.

Was being the keyword. Now he was nothing more than a blip in Magnus's past, a few brief moments that he would always look back on with pain and regret.

His phone rang again. He had been clutching it so tightly that the vibrations seemed to shake his very bones. He glanced down at the display, already knowing who it would be.

ISABELLE LIGHTWOOD. Again.

Magnus was almost tempted to answer, just to tell Isabelle to piss off. Apparently Alec had forgotten to warn the Shadowhunters that Magnus no longer wanted anything to do with any of them. He thought that he had made that perfectly clear earlier.

He decided to turn his phone to silent mode after pressing the ignore button. Isabelle could continue calling for as long as she wanted. Magnus Bane, the High Warlock of Brooklyn, had eight hundred years on her. His patience would win out in the end.

Chairman Meow seemed to decide that it was safe to approach again. He stared up at his master reproachfully, as if trying to gauge his reaction. Magnus heaved a sigh, holding out his hand for the small feline. The cat allowed itself to be scratched behind the ears.

"I'm sorry," Magnus said quietly, his voice cracking ever so slightly. "I know that you liked him too."

He closed his eyes, letting everything fade away to blackness. He was still exhausted from the previous battle, and he knew that he had left his bed before he should have… Slowly, he drifted off to sleep, one hand still clutching his phone like a lifeline.

Unbeknownst to him, it continued to flash on and off for the next few hours. The voicemail count continued to swell well into the pale hours of the morning.

13 MISSED CALLS. 6 VOICEMAILS.

Received 23:37: "Magnus, I'm not sure what you've been doing with my brother all day, but he won't return any of my texts. Can you kindly inform him that I will personally come over and drag his ass back home if he doesn't respond soon? Thanks!" BEEP.

Received 23:46: "I know that you two are probably engaging in some pretty intense post-battle sex, but I could really use my brother right now. Can you give him the message?" BEEP.

Received 00:55: "You know that it's rude to keep a lady waiting, right? I will come over there, warlock!" BEEP.

Received 01:49: "Alright, seriously. What are you guys up to?" BEEP.

Received 03:24: "Alec's voicemail is full... I don't think he's ever gone this long without checking his phone… Is everything alright? Should I be worried?" BEEP.

Received 06:51: "It's been hours, and I'm not waiting any longer. I don't care what Jace says, I'm coming over." BEEP.

...

That's all for now, folks! This was a bit of a teaser to help channel some of my feelings toward the end of CoLS. I want to continue it, but I'll probably wait to see if anyone shows any interest first.
PS: Did anyone read the teasers that Cassandra Clare had posted for CoLS before reading it? It was cruel to finally learn the context behind that Malec kiss, as if she was purposely trying to torture us. Now I am extremely sad. :(