The Watcher Finished

For all his cunning, for all his sharp edges and sharper words, Gideon did not understand his own bloodline.

Gideon saw Erin, his second cousin. She was not an Athanatos in name, but he saw her change. He saw that thing that would transform her. He saw the monstrous thing curling beneath the part veela's skin and assumed that all roads led to the same ending. That all the Athanatos women were the same.

But Taylor was not Erin. Taylor had never been Erin. They were not even the same breed. Taylor did not have to wait for something to crawl inside her and make a beast of her. She did not have to change to become other. She already was something else and it lived in her bones, something older, something worse. Gideon, did not even realize the mistake he was making.

"If I was changing, you would not need to ask." she announced. The words were meant to be final. A neat, practiced lie, tied up with a ribbon and left at Giddy's feet like a gift.

She mimicked her cousin, familiar with the intimidation game even if she was a slight thing. She understood the power of words, of moments. The girl let the moment linger. She let Gideon sit in it, let the elder Athanatos think that he had gotten under her skin, that she was on the edge of something.

And then she grinned, all teeth and mockery. "And if I was..." Her voice faded, then there was a brief pause. With the tilt of the girl's head, her voice turned sweet. "I'd eat you first." Before the world could get to him. Before the rot could set in. Before he lost whatever sweetness he had—if there was any left at all. Then after a moment of realization, she would add. "Actually, you would taste quite foul," she would smirk as if participating in an inside joke.

The words should have been a joke. They sounded like a joke, followed by a light chortle. But Gideon was forced to wonder if his sweet cousin meant those words or if she was being dramatic and strange. He enjoyed the oddity that was Taylor, he saw a lot of himself in her. How his jests were often veiled truths. He was left to wonder or perhaps hope that this consumption was... Well, they were in France.

Gideon was enduring her antics. Taylor wanted Gideon to leave this line of questioning, even if that meant driving him off. Giddy was insistent. Gideon was watching her. Watching her too closely. As if Gideon was not sure if he should have been amused or unsettled.

He reached for her and she stiffened.

Not obviously. Not noticeably to most. But enough for Gideon who knew her so well to see it. Enough for her to know he had felt it. She internally cursed. She should have leaned into him. Ruffled his hair. Touched his arm before he found hers. Taylor should not have stiffened. Taylor never stiffened. Not with him. She knew the value of being favored by the third son of the main house. She had him wrapped around her finger and she knew that he felt something for her. It was a power that she had and for all of his deductive powers of reasoning, his tests were far too obvious. She passed his tests a thousand times. She let him push in close. She let him chase, because she knew he liked it. He circled her like something hungry. And she had never flinched. Until now.

Damn it. Taylor's pulse kicked. She was not scared, she was frustrated because she knew that Gideon had noticed. Taylor's fingers twitched against the table, the urge to swat his hand away. To bite, the urge sudden and visceral but she pushed it down.

Or she tried.

Gideon's fingers barely brushed her wrist before she slapped them away, not a light, teasing bat but a quick, precise strike.

"Don’t," she snapped, her voice sharp enough to cut. The shift in her tone was immediate, her usual lazy amusement gone—replaced by something edged, something dangerous. Her agitation simmered through a crack. She was angry at herself, not him, but her anger was projected onto him.

Taylor exhaled slowly, deliberately, forcing herself back into something light, something easier, but her fingers curled around her teacup like she was holding back the need to claw. She pressed her impulses down, set them into a hidden box within herself. He needed to go, she needed to reset herself and she could not with his eyes on her.

Taylor sighed, shaking her head, as if he were the ridiculous one. "You are so serious, Giddy. I say one thing about eating you, and now you must be all dramatic about it."

She clicked her tongue, reaching for her tea, feigning complete indifference.

"I think you need more sugar," she mused, as if that was the problem, as if they were discussing nothing more than sweetness and spice and not the terrible thing slithering beneath her skin.

She took a sip, knowing full well he was still watching her.

Then, after a moment, after making sure the tension had stretched just long enough, she grinned— wide and playful and just sharp enough. "And if I did eat you," she added lightly, "I would start with the heart. If you have one." Then she laughed again, as if it meant nothing.

As if this wasn’t a conversation between two things with teeth. As if she hadn’t just lied to his face.

And before he could speak, before he could turn this moment back on her, she flicked her hand at him, shooing him away like an inconvenience. An overly affectionate cat in her space. An annoyance she no longer felt like indulging.

"Go," she said, her voice syrupy and commanding all at once. "You have bothered me enough. Be useful, go steal something, or find some poor soul to torment, hmm?" She made a vague, dismissive gesture. "Shoo, shoo."

Taylor flinched. It was not much. So faint that nobody else would notice. But Gideon noticed. Of course he noticed. It was different. A change in her that he was watching for. Taylor had never flinched before. This was new and that piqued his interest.

Gideon knew that Taylor was always good at this game. She had always let him circle her. Let him push. Let him prod. Let him test. He always had the feeling that she was testing him, although he could not be certain of her intended ends.

And now? Now, for the first time, Taylor had failed. Gideon wondered if this was the change or if this was something else. The depths of madness among the Athanatos women was something of legend, but he thought he had understood the madness when he saw it overtake Erin.

Little did Gideon know, he could not be more wrong.

Gideon’s smile did not falter. In fact, it widened with the revelation that something unsettled his cousin. She might give the impression of being carefree, but he recognized a level of control in her. This outburst, as pathetic as it was, was a crack. Gideon was finally seeing the truth beneath the polished exterior. His smile did not fade when she slapped his hand away. In fact, he relished the sting. His smile persisted when Taylor's voice sharpened, cutting into him like a blade made of bone. "Oh my," she reminded him of his dear, wretched mother. When she tried to smooth over what she had just done with mockery and mischief, as if she could simply erase what had just happened he continued to grin.

It was too late for Taylor. She had already given herself away and Gideon never forgot a weakness. Taylor mocked him still, as if she wasn’t tense. As if Taylor wasn’t unraveling at the edges. As if Gideon hadn’t just found something he wasn’t meant to see.

"And if I did eat you," Taylor said lightly, "I would start with the heart. If you have one." she laughed. She was trying to defuse with humor. Trying to distract with mischief. It was a common, repeated trick. Gideon let her laugh. He let Taylor pretend that she was the one pulling the strings. He wondered if she believed it.

This was what she needed. A moment to feel like she was still in control. A moment to feel like she could still keep him at arm’s length. But it wouldn’t last. Gideon was not the sort of thing that could be kept at arm’s length unless he wished to be there.

"Shoo, shoo." Taylor shooed Gideon away, as if he was something simple, as if he was something to be dismissed.

How adorable.

Gideon complied. He stood, slowly, deliberately. His chair scraped softly against the marble floor, the sound too even, too controlled, as if even the furniture knew not to disrupt the tension hanging between them.

Gideon did not look annoyed despite the dangerous aura that seemed to emanate from him. He did not pout or glare He did not huff like some petulant child sent away from the dinner table. Instead, Giddy simply… smiled. And that was so much worse. Because his smile was not playful. Not the usual, easy sort of grin he often wore as a mask to cover the nothingness. No, this expression was something quieter. Something colder. Gideon's smile rarely reached his eyes, but there was something chilling about this expression. About this uncanny glint in the teen's pale blue eyes.

Gideon reached for his still full cup of tea, lifting it with an air of bored detachment, as if he were already thinking about something else, as if she was no longer worthy of his full attention. A punishment, in its own way. Women, they want to be unseen but also remain the center of the universe.

Taylor wanted him to leave? Fine.

Gideon broke one of the main house's cardinal rules. An oddity. But also a display of ultimate confidence in his setting. He took a slow sip, savoring the taste, the warmth curling down his throat, as if the tea itself was steeped in secrets. Then, only then, did he set the cup down. A whisper of porcelain against stone.

"Enjoy your lunch, Taylor," Gideon said at last, his voice smooth, unreadable. It was far too late for a lazy woman's breakfast. "I’ll see you soon." And there was the promise. Not a threat. Not an ultimatum. Not a challenge. Just a simple, inarguable fact. Gideon would come back. Because Taylor was his. Because this was not over. Because he had seen her flinch. And one way or another, sooner or later, he would make her do it again. Just not in a crowd such as this.

He turned. And just like that, he was gone.

Date: 13th February 2025

Soon enough his breath steadied atoned by the calming relief that he had not been discovered. The pairs conversation had turned strange for lack of a better word and most of it flew completely over Matthew's head having stilled, like a fox in a cage. The world grew quiet around him until the screeching of a chair and Gideon's sickly sweet voice bode farewell to his guest, his date? Who even knew at this point. Whatever had happened between the pair Matthew was quite sure Gideon's exit meant more than he let on, in fact their whole relationship could potentially gleam new insight into the boy.

There was also the potential that this was another trap, perhaps Gideon was only goading him, pretending to have left so he could gloat with that stupid, smug, pureblood grin. Either way the truth remained, there was only so long he could hide under a table so one way or another he was going to have to face the music. Taking slow breaths he reached within himself to the point where he could feel nothing but soothing calm and letting the gentle rush of it flicker under the fibres of his skin he felt cool relief. If Gideon had wanted to find him he would have. He was safe, or as safe as he could be for now.

Slowly like a prey avoiding their predator he pulled back the white linen and began to crawl out from under the table from where he hid. The bright light of day filtered in through the grand windows making whisps of light dance through the air while light chatter had filled the once quiet space. There was something so intrinsically beautiful about it all but he knew there was still danger, that any number of his cabin mates might be awaiting him for a fight. Not to mention any member of S.N.O.G that still wished for revenge or answers he couldn't provide.

As the mirage recentred into focus and he found his vision cleared of the fantastical way he viewed the world his eyes drifted towards the place where the girl who had been shrouded by Gideon's back sat. Sitting delicately in a pose of poise and sophistication sat a beautiful young woman with stunning pale blonde hair that bobbed above her shoulder. Dressed in finery and gentile in presence Matthew found himself lost for words as he settled his gaze upon her, she was a rose. Immaculate in appearance and seemingly delicate but from the way she had managed Gideon and the brief whispers of conversation he had heard, she had more than a fair share of thorns.

Stunned to the spot where he was crawling he watched as she drew her cup to her lips and wondered in what world Gideon Athanatos had managed to convince someone so alluring to date him. Supposedly that was the Athanatos charm, he certainly had been drawn in by it so why should this girl be any different. Suddenly urges to know more about her filled his thoughts, ideas about how well she might know Gideon. The weaknesses she could expose if he had any, leverages he could use to navigate the precarious relationship he had found himself in with the boy. And yet if she was dangerous enough to ward of Giddy might she be just another thorn in his side.

Pulling himself fully out he stood and dusted invisible lint off of his vintage jeans avoiding eye contact and acting entirely nonchalant about the fact he had just pulled himself out from under a table. Sneaking a glance he wondered if she was intrigued or bewildered or if she even cared in the slightest but if she was looking at him he would crook his smile in a half smirk his golden flecked eyes flaring wildly in the early morning sun.

Interacting with Taylor Athanatos @Aamon Athanatos

Taylor was unaware that she was being watched by Matthew Campbell, but she was aware that she was being observed. As an Athanatos, eyes would irrevocably on her. If it was not her name and her personal reputation, it would be that of her family. Allies and rivals alike tend to monitor from the periphery. She felt the wizard before she saw him.

She lifted the rim of the porcelain cup to her lips and watched Gideon leave. She wondered what the consequence of her brief liberty might be. He was not one to leave her, paranoid to a fault she wondered what actually drove him from brunch. Her thoughts would not linger on him for long, even if Matthew had not emerged from beneath a table. She was going to find someone fun, have an adventure and hopefully kill avoid witnesses.

Indeed, a boy had crawled out from beneath a table. Crawled. Like a fox peeking out of its den, trying to decide whether it was safe to be seen. A guilty little forest creature caught in the open.

She made no effort to hide the way her gaze trailed over him—assessing, amused. This was no great shadow stepping from the dark. This was a boy. Her lips twitched slightly against the rim of her cup.

Oh, she liked this already. The boy was handsome, perhaps, but they were always handsome, weren’t they? Though not in the deliberate way of Gideon, whose beauty was polished, curated, like something crafted to disarm and unsettle. No, this one was different. Unruly, perhaps careless, yet a specimen in spite of indifference and a lack of refinement.

And yet—he had been hiding.

From whom? From what?

Taylor did not believe in coincidences.

Slowly, deliberately, she set her teacup down with a soft clink, then folded her hands atop the table, tilting her head like a curious bird. Perhaps from this askew vantage point, the scene would make sense. Her blue eyes dragged over him, slow, assessing—making no attempt to be subtle.

She had no flipping idea what or why he was there. The stranger dusted off his jeans, attempting to appear nonchalant, like men did when they did not want to be asked questions.

Alas, Taylor liked questions.

She smiled, soft, inviting—dangerous.

And then, without breaking eye contact, she patted the seat across from her.

Ты лисица? “Ty lisitsa?” she asked, the Russian words rolling lazily from her tongue, voice lilting, playful. Then, in perfect, slow English, she translated, her accent thick and warm. “Are you fox?”

A pause.

A smirk.

“Or are you rat? Crawling beneath tables, hiding from big, bad wolves?” She rested her chin in her palm, eyes glinting with something unknowable. “You must be something very interesting to be sneaking around when Giddy is near.” Pronounced 'Geedy.' He was not likely here for her, she did not recognize him. If he intended to harm her, he would have waited until she left public view. He would not have revealed himself. He would have awaited one of many opportunities that would have been advantageous to him.

She let the name hang between them, watching him closely, waiting for the reaction.

Then she gestured toward the now-empty seat again, her smile widening. "Come, little fox. Sit." She exhaled, slow, knowing. "If you are running from wolf, I will not stop you. But if you are running to wolf? Well."
And with that, she leaned back, crossing her legs neatly, waiting. Waiting to see what kind of creature he really was.

“Regardless, then you should at least have breakfast first.” At this point he might notice one aspect about the small girl that seemed inhuman. The pastries she had carted to her table that she had shared with Gideon were numerous. An impossibility for consumption, there was a defiance of the laws of conservation of mass. Apparently she was willing to share in the saccharine bounty. She nudged at an empty plate. Gideon never ate, whatever he had in front of him was both untouched and only there for show.

@Matthew Campbell

Date: 13th February 2025

As there eyes locked he found a similar expression locked in her steely gaze, an invite, perhaps even a challenge that was only reinforced as she patted the padded seat covering. The girl was no dainty thing, perhaps one might mistake her as such given her charming exterior but the cunning in her eyes told a different story. And the ability to manage Gideon another one entirely. Matthew would have to keep his guard, there was only one slight problem, he was terrible at poker.

The young snake didn't meant to laugh, in fact it was quite rude and he felt the red heat rising within his cheeks of embarrassment, yet still he did. A rough bark of a laugh that dispelled any notions of class he might be mistaken for, though his crocs betrayed that far before. It was simply that Russian was not the language he expected to hear from her gentile manner. Stumbling out a babble of apology he opted for honesty hopeful it would soften the uncivility of his person, "Sorry, I don't mean to laugh it's just I seem to have a knack for meeting fair haired Russians in spring, this makes two years in a row."

Luckily for the insolent boy the girl seemed to take no notice of him as she was sizing up his character while slipping into quirky, yet endearingly accented English. The notion that he was some kind of creature was not one that bothered him, in fact of all the accusations and names he had been called over the years this was minimal. But when the mention of the Athanatos puppet master was brought up he couldn't hide the conflict from his face. Even the sweeter pronunciation of his name that graced her lips caused more warring in his young mind. The truth was that Matthew had no clue how to feel about the blonde Athanatos. They had met only yesterday and already Gideon had gotten him into trouble, the very thing he was supposed to be avoiding. Yet the worst thing, was that as much as it pained him to admit it, Matthew was still drawn to him.

Hiding none of this from his face he lingered on the stare of the girl, her small smirk and pondering eyes and wondered once more what their connection was. Whatever thoughts Matthew was conjuring to tie them together were disrupted as she asked him to sit, presenting herself as just as intoxicatingly drawing as the golden Athanatos. He was a fly suck in the tangled web of two spiders and there was far little Matthew hated more than the spindly demons. However, unlike the poor, trapped fly the brunette had weaved himself into their web and he would only escape by playing their game.

Watching intently as Taylor drew herself back with all the practiced nonchalance he had failingly attempted just moments before he took up her often and placed himself down on the seat with a pleasant smile. Twisting his ring as he moved he drew on the well of calm within as armour feeling the threads of it circle him in a safe embrace. That control allowed him to control his face and holding her stare he spoke with an ease he didn't know himself capable of, "Well, I love foxes and as for wolves I live with one and he's more annoying than he is scary. Gideon on the other hand is a different thing all together, I'm not sure I quite know what I'm dealing with there, do you? I'm guessing with the way you handled him you do?"

Tearing away at a piece of pastry left abandoned on the plate where Gideon had once sat he watched the light fluffy innards pull apart with ease under his touch. There hadn't been much time to eat sufficiently before he had to flee from the accusations and his stomach growled with the need for sustenance. Perhaps knowing who had left it here should have filled his mind with wild imaginations of poison or laxatives but Matthew lived in reality, and he wasn't about to fuel such outlandish machinations.

Swallowing the small piece of pastry it occurred to him that the pair hadn't properly been introduced so sitting back in his chair to mirror her position he smiled warmly, ignoring her potential threat. "Pardon my lack of manners. It would be an honour to have breakfast with you miss. The names Matthew by the way, I'd pretend to do the fancy pureblood greeting bollocks but If we're being honest I don't think either of us believes I could pull that off. The crocs tend to give me away." Flashing an equally playful smile at the girl as he slid up the tablecloth to reveal his fanciful green footwear. Eyes moving swiftly to her stacked plate he raised his eyebrows impressed by the selection, "You have a great appetite, makes a refreshing difference from my cabin mates, they're all hysterical about being poisoned." His tone cutting, poignant to show how dramatic he felt about their farce.

Interacting with @Aamon Athanatos @Solomon Lear

Taylor’s fingers drummed once—lightly, rhythmically—against the rim of her teacup as she watched One Matthew Campbell, a stranger to her, settle in like someone preparing for their own execution with a pleasant smile and a threadbare poker face. She’d seen boys like Matthew before. Clever in theory, charming in flashes, but with just enough chaos in their bones to do something deeply foolish, like sit in an Athanatos' seat while it was still warm. A part of her wondered if that was mere happenstance and if he was truly so reckless, not that she would bid him to leave either way. Disasters draw human interest in the same way as flame draws the moth. Humans were by nature, cruel creatures even if they refused to admit this.

Taylor's eyes flicked to the half-eaten thing in his hand, and she hummed softly. Not a warning. Not exactly. More like the sound one might make when watching a man play with a snake and assume it’s tame.

“Ah,” she said, smiling faintly, “You are very brave. Or very hungry. Either way, it is how many tragic Russian love stories begin.” Her heavy accent curled around her words, making her words seem heavier, as if they had actual weight.

The Athanatos took another sip of her tea—plain, less an incredible amount of sugar that made the tea more like syrup; otherwise untouched, trustworthy only because she poured it herself from the communal kettle—before placing the cup down gently and returning her full attention to him. The stranger had a good face. Honest, even. Honest faces were always dangerous. Not because of what they said—but because of what they believed. Sometimes what they fought for.

"You like foxes?" she repeated, as if genuinely pondering. “Hmm. Fox is clever. Quick. Always looking for warm place to hide.” A beat. “But wolf does not care where fox hides. Wolf has teeth. And patience.” Her thoughts immediately went to Gideon. He did not have a wolfish exterior, often draped in a facade of innocence and youth, yet he was known to be quite cruel.
But where was the poetry?

Taylor leaned in slightly, resting her elbows on the table, the curve of her smile still warm—but now with the faintest tilt, a kind of old knowing, something not entirely of a girl her age.

“Gideon,” she echoed, the name heavily accented with a heavy e. Like a warning in a forgotten tongue. Or a curse. “Moy kuzén.” My cousin she claimed.

Her accent curled thick around the words—possessive, affectionate, and just a bit cruel.

“Giddy is many things,” she said continued. “Charming. Watchful. Very dramatic.” Her blue eyes sparked. “Always hungry for attention. Giddy must be fed, or he starts pulling wings off flies just to see if they still buzz.” Yes, she knew him for his true and terrible nature. The creatures and sometimes even people of low enough import simply disappear when Gideon gets bored, or even worse angry.

Taylor watched as Matthew tore another piece of pastry, as if it could be as easily pulled apart as the truths between them. He had asked if she knew what she was dealing with.

The girl did. But she would not say it. She would not admit to just how dangerous he was in a public venue, too many eyes and even more ears. She would not speak of him in daylight, not when the air still remembered Gideon’s cologne. Instead, she tilted her head and smiled. “I know enough not to ask him questions I do not want answered. To play when he asks to play and to play well enough that he never tires,” she admitted. Was it a call for help or instructions? There was no knowing here.

The boy introduced himself as Matthew, and Taylor watched the name settle into the air like smoke. He was still pretending it was all very normal, this little breakfast between monsters. That was sweet.

He showed her the crocs. Green. Offensive. She grinned—an open, amused expression that somehow made her look younger, despite the age in her pale eyes.

“Aha! Yes, the shoes do say, ‘I have nothing to lose.’ Is very good for survival. Bold. My babushka would approve. Or beat you with broom." She shrugged, "It depends.” They looked like the sort of shoes one would wear in a communal shower to prevent athletes foot.

Taylor tried to steal a corner of Matthew's pastry without asking—testing him, watching to see if he flinched, if he reacted. If he did, the Athanatos woman would way nothing. If he didn’t, she nodded in quiet approval.

When he mentioned his cabinmates and their fears of poison, her brows lifted slightly.

“They are not wrong,” Taylor said sweetly, biting into the pastry. “But poison is very old-fashioned. So hard to make poison look like accident these days.” She added, as it it was common knowledge. Not that she was wrong, the poison had to be incredibly effective to make it worthwhile. The effect would be quick, likely within twenty minutes. The source would be rather obvious and the duration of effect, be it lethality or something more creative really depended on the metabolism of the substance. Secret poisoning was unreliable, hard to effectively, accurately dose. It was so much easier when they were tied to a chair and fed.

Then she sat back, mirroring him perfectly, and offered her hand across the table. Daintily. Like they were at the finest garden party, even if the boy was wildly out of place.

“I am Taylor Athanatos,” she said, her voice gentle, eerie in its calm. “I do not do the bowing, but I will not curse you if you kiss my hand.”

A beat.

Then a slow, dangerous smile.

“Unless you bite. Then, I bite back.”

She let her fingers linger, just a moment too long. Just enough to let him wonder if she was joking. Her eyes flickered to the door Gideon had exited only minutes earlier. "And I assume you already know my date," Gideon.

@Matthew Campbell

Date: 13th February 2025

Even in her thicker Russian accent the word cousin was easily deciphered and the snake understood more significantly just how tangled a web they had spun. It was starting to feel like this was some kind of karmic retribution of cosmic intervention, three Athanatos' in as many weeks. Whatever omnipotent force was linking him to these aristocrats had a great deal of explaining to do, and a greater deal of apologising.

Inherited like all the rest of that family, the girl used words like masks disguising many emotions in each one so that deciphering her feelings required complexity. Matthew was playing a chess game without being able to see the board, a disadvantage he had no hope of overcoming but still he watched and listened with hope that something would slip. That a piece would fall and he could learn even a fraction of his dynamic in the game. She shared the same cruelty Matthew had seen Gideon capable of and flourished herself in the innocence he mastered. How he hadn't worked it out himself was beyond him for as soon as it had been revealed the connection was sickly obvious.

The way Taylor spoke of Gideon did nothing to ease his anxiety but confirmed his suspicions of his danger. It came as little surprise to the boy this time given his acumen to attract such problems. The law of attraction did not favour him anymore than life had proven to, one more shred of evidence that the world was firmly against him however illogical it seemed. Doing well to remain calm he felt himself settle slightly with her response to his shoes even managing to summon another laugh. "Your babushka sounds like fun, maybe she can get Giddy with the broom instead. Though I suppose family doesn't attack family." Then just as quickly as comfort was established the Russian retook control stealing a part of the pastry from his hand. A clear power move given the stupendous supply on offer to her, but he wouldn't flinch or draw back, instead he just watched and as she nodded he offered in return a sickly sweet, "You're welcome."

With his new knowledge of her surname it was hardly surprising that Taylor shared the familial fear for poison but at least she was more reasonable about it. While her comment of poisoning might've caused alarm in any other conversation it only made sense that such paranoid individuals would know their fears. In fact Matthew would be entirely unphased if the Athanatos lot micro dosed themselves as a defensive strategy.

With all the grace of a practiced predator Taylor moved her hand daintily forward another test, another play in their game he still couldn't comprehend. Introducing herself claiming the surname that haunted him with perfect manners and a smile that could cut glass he felt himself grow more caught in her web. To deny her was almost as dangerous as to appease but perhaps he was judging too quickly. Perhaps the girls words were warnings and she moved from a place of protection. Perhaps. Either way, a beautiful girl was offering her hand and he was uncouth enough as an individual, this was the least he could do. Quirking his mouth to a smirk he rose one eyebrow and leaned forward. "I'll leave the biting to the next lucky soul."

As his lips brushed against the smooth skin of the Russian girl he found himself momentarily stunned as he processed the information she had so casually dropped. Lingering around her hand he drew his eyes up to meet hers and with a darkness to his eyes spoke quietly and forced, "Your cousin's your date, that's-" antiquated, abhorrent, disturbed, very pureblood, really the list was infinite and entirely negative, "-interesting. I can't say we do that in the muggle world but who am I to judge." Allowing his head to then drift away from her he gently released her hand and returned to his casual lounge placing his foot above his right thigh in the male equivalent of her crossed leg.

There were moments like this where Matthew understood the difference between him and the purists he met. Where he could almost tangibly see the different threads of fate that controlled their lives and how these threads could never intertwine. Where he could understand their hate for him. It wasn't just a difference of blood, but a difference of mentality and morality. He could just as little understand their culture as they could his, the only difference being that he didn't actively hate them for it. Yet Taylor had given no impression she despised him, no it was more complicated than that. Much like Gideon he was a plaything, an experiment, but unlike them that was not how Matthew saw the world and thus it flew entirely over his head. So desperate to be accepted he couldn't see he never would.

Determined to move past such differences he focused on the question rather than the implications and unlike the trained Athanatos spoke with no care for who may be listening, "We're rooming together, and he got me to poison ivy the rest of our group because I'm the kind of idiot who gets caught up in his games and now I suppose I better keep at it. I have a feeling you're not kidding about his insatiability. Don't suppose you're willing to help a stranger learn to survive?" There was a sense of desperation in his tone but his body didn't relinquish to it, after all Gideon was just the newest in a long list of people whom Matthew had to watch out for. Yet something about the way his heart skipped a beat warned him that this was different, more dangerous.

Interacting with @Aamon Athanatos @Solomon Lear

Taylor’s expression didn’t change at first. She simply blinked, her arm extended and unmoving as Matthew brushed his lips across her hand. Her fingers, smooth and cold, they did not tense. They didn’t tremble. They just waited with expectation.

"I'll leave the biting to the next lucky soul."

She could not help but smirk. "Shame, that is my favorite part," she quipped.

She introduced herself as an Athanatos. That Gideon was her cousin. That Gideon was also her date. Well, date was a strong word, not for lack of effort on Gideon's part as Taylor continued to deny him softly enough that he would always return. He would not relent, but eventually she would. Control is something that could not be maintained from a static state, she needed to remain in dynamic control of the situation as she knew it.

While the act of inbreeding was taboo to many wizards, less so to purebloods who married within lines with certainty to ensure the prestige and inheritance of their heirs. When Matthew's eyes finally rose to meet Taylor's, he rephrased her relationship with Gideon. “Your cousin’s your date.” There was a hesitation from him and there was a flicker of something else from her. Something too fast to catch but far too old to belong in a girl her age. A ripple of shadow beneath a still surface. A tightening behind her eyes that could be felt.

"Yes," Taylor said simply. No explanation. No justification. The Seer recognized the pause, the term 'interesting' and the passive state of his judgement. Everyone judges, most of all those that don't.

Then the Athanatos smiled. Not a soft thing. Not a pretty thing. A smile was an expression, a gesture, an attitude. It offered no assurances in this state. It granted no levity. It was the kind of smile that belonged to something older than this place. Something buried in the ice and bone of womanhood, inherited through ash and claw. This was a smile carved from the legacy of generations of silenced girls. Girls who did not get to choose their fates, only their responses.

“Where I come from,” Taylor said, her accent thickening like snow in a storm in Siberia, “it is not strange. In our family, cousins marry. Uncles raise daughters until they are useful. Mothers vanish into locked rooms. And girls...” She paused, her voice remaining cold, words bound in frost. “Girls disappear. Or they go mad. Whichever comes first.” There was no pleading, no fear in her words. It was simply the way of things as the Athanatos woman knew them, justice and equity were not a part of the equation. "Have you not noticed how the main family lacks women?" She added almost conversationally, but she would fail to further elaborate. Her family was complex, something that could not be explained so easily over a bit of tea and pastry.

Taylor sipped her tea then, almost daintily, as if she hadn’t just described her own fate like a bedtime story read too often. She did not look away from Matthew as she drank. She let him see her. All of her. At least for a moment. Not the polished surface the athanatos clan offers to the world, but the rotting garden beneath it. Of course he would have more questions than answers and if he truly knew her cousins, he would know better than to trust a word uttered by an Athanatos. That was a part of the family's armor wasn't it? Their deceptive nature weaponized.

Who cared?

“Where I come from,” Taylor continued, “a girl without a father is nothing. Especially when her mother is...” She gave a little flutter of her fingers, something vague and dark. “...not quite alive anymore, even if she still breathes.” She shrugged, she did not have a deep affection for either even if she had some good memories of both. Her father was ambitious and not particularly kind. Her mother was a weak-willed, vain thing. Taylor only wondered why she was cast away, she was so easy to control.

Taylor was referencing her own mother, or lack of one. Her recently felled father. Not that she lacked a maternal influence, she lived with a trio of wise, older women. Distant relatives. Women, angry over the state of things. Of how their bloodline laced through generations of excellence, only to erase their half. "I live with my babushkas," she held up three fingers to indicate a number. "They are quite old, even more strange, but they understand the way of things." Babushka having two meanings, one being grandmother and the other being 'old woman.' She meant the later, she lived with three old women in one of the most isolated places in Russia.

“Gideon is no escape,” Taylor said. “Even if he thinks he loves me," Gideon is not capable. He was not going to 'save' her from her fate, he was going to seal it. "He is just the door that opens. The house behind it?” She leaned forward, eyes like broken azure glass beneath moonlight. “The house is still burning.”

"We're rooming together, and he got me to poison ivy the rest of our group because I'm the kind of idiot who gets caught up in his games and now I suppose I better keep at it. I have a feeling you're not kidding about his insatiability. Don't suppose you're willing to help a stranger learn to survive?"

Matthew spoke of Gideon’s games. Of poison ivy. Of manipulation. Of survival.

Taylor tilted her head as she listened, her pearls shifted about her neck like a noose had been lowered about the slender stem. And when he asked if she would help, if she would teach him how to survive...

She laughed.

It was a tinkling sound. Low. Not cruel. Not mocking. But familiar. As though someone had asked her the same question once, long ago. And Taylor had said yes. And the ashes of that answer still clung to her skin.

“Help you?” Taylor replied. “I do not know how to survive Gideon.” Her smile returned, this time softer, yet eerier for it. “I only know how to be interesting enough that he does not grow bored.” She traced a finger around the rim of her teacup, her gaze distant now, eyes caught in memories too cold to thaw.

“But yes,” Taylor added, tone brighter, falsely so. “I will help you. If only to avoid him learning I had brunch with another."

Taylor leaned in slightly, her voice lowering. “But remember something, little fox.” Taylor's hand cupped over Matthew's ear, he would feel her warm breath run over the shell of his ear. Whispered like a secret “Gideon keeps pets he knows how to break but has not broken yet.”

Date: 13th February 2025

Morality aside Matthew was no less bound by circumstance than she and for a second he was sure he saw something lighter in the girl across from him. Still a wolf but one that fought for survival rather than pleasure. His own eyes reflecting a knowing sorrow as the glint in them died away ever so slightly as if the sunlit flecks were setting. However, being a boy that knew the rot of pity he denied himself to glower it upon her for even a second. Cowering his eyes to the plate one could misplace his action for fear rather than protection but what Taylor thought of him really mattered very little. Not because he had mastered the inner workings of his self portrait but because no matter her judgement, it wouldn't hold a candle to the flame of his own.

When he returned to her gaze his own irises steeled behind walls, her fractalized eyes would too be locked behind the cold walls of indifference controlling her narrative. There were so many questions burning on his tongue, so many things he desperately wished to express but their worlds, their lives belonged in different worlds and always would. A language barrier of culture divided them and to speak would only reveal his blatant naivety. Still his heart tugged at him to apologise to her, for what she described seemed like no life at all. An ornament on a shelf collecting dust with no hope of being polished, just waiting to be discarded and replaced. Little did he know Taylor's lack of intention to follow the woman in her families trend but while the strength to overcome was admirable, he knew from personal experience that most would rather never having to have channelled such strength in the first place.

Adversity could inspire and reinforce a person, but it could just as easily break them.

To say that Matthew was confused as to how a mother could breathe without being alive was an understatement but suddenly he grew colder, smaller as he shrivelled down wringing his hands together. Anything to bring the ring closer to his conscious mind. Then came the shrug and for the first time he saw Taylor to be a true Athanatos, cold and unfeeling, incapable of human compassion. People were allowed to hate their parents, Matt knew the many complexities to familial relationships but this wasn't hatred, it was plain indifference and that was callous. Maybe his own beliefs were too rigid, too unmoving, but on that topic he would never waver.

So perhaps there house deserved to burn, at least finally the Athanatos family might know what it was to feel fire under their skin.

The fact still remained and if anything was even more reinforced, he needed her help if he was to survive them. Aamon, at least for now, was easily escapable but he had little chance when it came to Mathias and although as the eldest he should have posed the greatest threat. Something deep within knew it was Gideon he really had to be careful with, perhaps because he knew that, deep within, while Mathias could hurt him, Gideon could corrupt him. Then there was Taylor, the unknown enigma who had the gall to laugh only it was not cold like her previous state. No, there was something deeper more familiar in the laugh, confirming the devastating reality of his cage. Imprisoned by his own hands he had walked straight into Gideon's game and he was now just another piece, incapable of moving without the guidance of another. Matthew had thought Taylor was on the other side of the board but really she was just another piece. A queen to his pawn perhaps, but a piece none the less.

Listening intently he took note of the way she spoke, how she manipulated intonation and pitch to display emotions that didn't meet her eyes. Eyes that spoke instead of her past, spoke of the sufferings she had already experienced and a knowing that more would come. Then with calculation she moved forward, the second Athanatos to come within centimetres of him in one day. With a whisper she would implant her wisdom, just a simple phrase but heavy with warning. Positioning placing her own ear next to his mouth he whispered in return, careful to mask his tone but unpracticed in their game of deception, "I suppose that means he knows how to break you then." A cold reminder of their shared torment then drawing back ever so slightly so that his flared eyes could funnel straight into her own, "You don't strike me as someone who would relinquish that information freely. Nor the kind of person who would allow yourself to become powerless. So how do you survive?"

Leaning back there was no more casual air to his presence, in fact it felt that the very world had grown still and silent in their vicinity but he did not back down. A fox he might be, facing against a wolf and knowing the pack circled out of view, but he would not lower himself to run. Matthew had grown up fighting for things people took as a given right and the last thing he would allow was a group of purebloods to break him. Taking in the whole view of the girl analysing her he wondered if she would be annoyed or proud. She wanted him to fight, to not endure Gideon's breaking but accept it would never end, but in reality how little she likely cared. After all he was on their chessboard but he was not a part of her game. Letting his hands rest upon his legs, he spoke plainly, "How will he try to break me?"

Interacting with @Aamon Athanatos @Solomon Lear

With a family so concerned with fate, she did not believe in coincidences. Moments were rarely random. She had not survived this long by being a passive player in this game. He was here for Gideon specifically. Once his name was uttered, the brunette's interest in her cousin was piqued.

“I suppose that means he knows how to break you then.”

That was a way of looking at things. That Gideon held some sort of secret knowledge that ensured the girl's destruction. The truth was more straight forward. Taylor's smile did not falter, as eerie as that was when the conversation swayed to her end. But her shadow shifted behind her chair in a way that had nothing to do with the sun. "Yes, I bleed," she replied simply. She did not need to remind him that her parents were dead, or in the case of her mother, a fate significantly worse. That she lived in one of the most remote places in the world, Norilsk. While the population of city, the northernmost in the world was larger than many would assume, it was cut off from much of the world. It made it hard to run.

Matthew would not know it. Could not. But an inquiry such as his could have killed a lesser boy in her family. Not because the words were cruel. But because they were true and people prefer packages lies and pretty fantasies over hard truths. And the Athanatos do not forgive truths spoken plainly.

Taylor lifted her cup to her lips, took a slow, quiet sip, and when she placed it back down, the room felt colder. Not visibly. Not physically. But spiritually. The kind of cold that creeps into one's bones and makes one's ancestors whisper.

Her voice, when she finally spoke, was gentle. Far too gentle.

“I do not survive by pretending I cannot be broken,” she said, her voice low, steady, strange. “I survive by learning where to bend. And how to bite when they think I’m limp.” The statement was at best boastful. The girl lived in Siberia, isolated from peers and family besides those assigned. She breathed and thrived by the grace of the Athanatos family alone.

Then, softer, with something close to a sigh, if ghosts could sigh, “I survive because no one’s decided yet if I’m better off dead.” Then a flicker of a smile. It was something both beautiful and terrible.

That was more accurate. But she was doing something about it. She was not waiting for the axe to fall on her head. She knew her value. she was a Seer, and while she did not have the same rights or opportunities that the young men of her clan had, she held a modicum of value and even power. It was not a secret, a family venerated for their bloodline of Seers, required actual Seers to if nothing else, toil.

"How will he try to break me?"

The cup clicked softly on the table.

“You see…” Taylor's voice was slower now, laced with something older, as though the syllables were being borrowed from the women who now raised her. Those crones in their quiet hut near the poisoned river, where fires whispered and bones told fortunes. “Gideon is not the fire. Gideon is hands," her tone had darkened, cooled like a hearth gone cold overnight. "Gideon is pressure. Bruise. Blade.” Her eyes studied him as she spoke. “He breaks bones like toys. Not to kill. To test. And when you do not scream…” She tilted her head, her scarf falling forward over one shoulder like a noose. “He makes it worse.”

She described Gideon more like a mindless storm, a state of nature. But he was far from mindless, he was just compelled by forces that were outside conventional understanding. “He loves the pain. Physical. Emotional. Psychological. He wants to taste it on your breath. He wants to see it curl in your spine. Not fast. No—slow.” It was his sin, his base nature.

“If you are truly unfortunate. He would work on you, one crack at a time. One secret at a time. Until you forget how shattered you are, even think he’s saved you from it all. And then he reminds you he caused it.” she gave him a look of almost pity. her voice did not waver, nor did her expression that seemed amused if one were to look at her pale lips and how they curled upward. It was only the eyes that seemed to be left out of the lie. Just the terrible calm of someone who has already lived it.

“You think you’ll see it coming. That you’ll be clever enough. That you’ll know when the teeth sink in.” She leaned forward, her voice a whisper. “You won’t.”

She shook her head.

"You want to survive?” she asked. “Then never flinch. Not when Giddy jokes. Not when Giddy touches. Not when Giddy hurts you and tells you it’s for your own good.” She paused, “especially not when it feels good. That’s when you’re already his.”

Taylor picked up a pastry, examined it like it was a relic, and then offered it to him across the table. “Never let him know which piece of you matters most. Not your pride. Not your friends. Not even your shoes.” She gave a small, wry glance at the crocs, as if amused—but her eyes were dead serious.

And then, almost as an afterthought, she added, “Also, don’t sleep on your back. He finds that very convenient.”