Another Step Complete

Gideon did not flinch.

Not when Mathias tugged him closer, not when the sharp hiss of his words brushed against his ear like the whisper of a blade. His blue eyes stayed fixed on his older brother’s face—calm, bright, and brimming with mock innocence.

But beneath the surface? Beneath the child-like mask? Fire.

He didn’t bother to struggle against the grip on his scarf. If anything, he tilted his head slightly, as though Mathias were an overbearing parent straightening his tie rather than a predator attempting to corner him. How pathetically quaint.

“Careful, Matt,” Gideon said, his voice light, almost sing-song. “You’ll wrinkle it.” He reached up, fingers brushing Mathias’s knuckles as if to pry them loose, but the touch lingered—too soft, too deliberate. A challenge.

“Is this about the article?” He laughed—a bright, airy sound that belonged to someone younger, someone less dangerous than the boy who stood before Mathias now. “You know the Prophet loves a good story. Maybe I should be flattered? Or are you?” He tilted his head, blonde hair brushing his cheek as his eyes glinted with amusement. “I didn’t think you’d get so jealous.”

But Mathias’s stare didn’t waver, and Gideon felt the sharp tug of tension pull at the corners of his mind. This wasn’t a game he could win by being careless.

So he dropped the act.

The laugh faded. The smile didn’t, but it sharpened—thin and predatory. “I should be asking you the same question,” Gideon said softly, his tenor becoming an alto. He leaned his face inward, while shorter than his brother by, a series of cracks and pops in his back as he grew several inches in moments, bringing his face to a place that was far too close for comfort. “What exactly are you planning, big brother? With, Winnie was it? I know you, Mathias. You don’t like loose ends. Mudblood... halfblood... it is all the same with us isn't it.” He saw how he had paraded the girl around these past few years, the pink eyesore that she was. Too bright. Offensively pedestrian. Sure, she was probably a good time. But muggle girls are good for only a short time.

He let the weight of the words settle before slipping free of the scarf with an infuriating ease, stepping back just far enough to remind Mathias that he wasn’t trapped.

“You think Finnegan’s a toy?” Gideon’s smile deepened. “You think I don’t know that? That I’m not already three moves ahead of you?” He took another step back, his voice dropping to a whisper. “Maybe that’s what scares you.”

And then, with a sudden burst of movement, Gideon struck.

Not with magic. Not with words. With force. He shoved Mathias back against the stone wall, hard enough to make the torches flicker. His hands pressed flat against his brother’s chest, pinning him—not out of strength but out of sheer audacity.

“Don’t mistake me for someone you can control.” The words came out colder than the dungeon air. “I’m not one of your pawns. I might play the child, but you and I both know that in this game it is a lot less about Pride and more about depravity”

Then, as quickly as it had come, the tension broke. Gideon stepped back, brushing imaginary dust from his sleeves and flashing that same harmless smile.

“Relax, Mattie,” he teased, voice lilting back to childish sweetness. “You’re supposed to be the calm one... the gentle one... some daresay, the sane one. Remember?” He turned and started walking, pausing just long enough to glance back over his shoulder.

“Oh—and don’t worry about Connor.” His grin was all teeth. “I’ll take care of him.”

Mathias moved before Gideon could take another step.

The shift was sharp and precise, honed by years of control, but there was something darker lurking beneath the polished surface now—something coiled tight, like a serpent ready to strike.

He seized Gideon’s arm—not the scarf this time, but his wrist, fingers pressing down just enough to make his younger brother pause. It wasn’t a reckless move, not with Gideon. Recklessness with him was a death wish. This was deliberate, a calculated reminder of who he was dealing with.

The torches flickered again, shadows lengthening as if the dungeon itself had turned its attention toward them. Mathias’s voice dropped low, quiet enough that even the stones might struggle to catch the words. “You’re not walking away from me.” His voice shook a bit with that declaration.

He didn’t let go.

“I don’t think you understand the position you’re in, Giddy.” The nickname was laced with venom now, stripped of affection. “You think this little act of yours—this mask—makes you untouchable, but you’re wrong. I see through it. I always have.”

He leaned in, eyes narrowing as his grip tightened just slightly. Not enough to bruise, not yet, but enough to warn.

“You can try to play the snake all you want, but even snakes get cornered. And when they do, they either bare their fangs—” His gaze flicked down, sharp and deliberate, to the faint smear of blood still lingering at Giddy's collar, reminding him of where the boy just was, before meeting Gideon’s eyes again. “Or they get their heads cut off.”

He let the threat linger, unspoken but heavy.

“You don’t scare me.” The words were slow, deliberate. “And if you think you’re going to get away with dragging this family through the mud over some half-baked attempt to prove yourself, you’re even more deluded than I thought.”

There it was. The crack in the mask.

Not anger—no, Mathias wouldn’t allow that—but possession. A brother’s control masquerading as protection.

“I don’t care what you do to Finnegan.” The words were sharper this time, colder. “Use him. Break him. Bleed him dry, for all I care. But you’re not dragging me into your mess.”

Finally, Mathias loosened his hold, but he didn’t step back. He stayed close, his voice softening to something almost conspiratorial.

“Or maybe this isn’t about Finnegan at all. Maybe it’s about you.” He tilted his head slightly, studying Gideon like he was an equation to be solved. “Tell me, little brother… do you even know what you want from him? Or is this just another game you’ve already lost?”

He let the question hang there, daring Gideon to answer. But even as his tone softened, his eyes stayed sharp—watchful.

Because if Gideon moved again, Mathias would be ready.

Gideon didn’t flinch.

Not when Mathias grabbed him, not when his brother’s grip tightened just enough to bruise if it lingered, not even when the words—venomous and cold—slithered between them like a blade unsheathed. No, Gideon didn’t flinch.

But he smiled.

It was slow, lazy, and wrong—the kind of smile that crawled under your skin and stayed there. A child playing pretend, but something in the way it curled didn’t match the softness it was supposed to imitate.

“Touchy,” he murmured with that same childish tone that had become so practiced, and the word was a blade in its own right. “Is that any way to treat your favorite little brother?”

His free hand rose, tracing the path of Mathias' eyes, his slender fingers brushed over the faint stain of blood on his collar like it was nothing more than a curious smudge. But the pressure lingered just a second too long—almost thoughtful, almost reverent—before he wiped it away.

And then he laughed.

Soft, sharp, and utterly humorless.

“Careful, Mattie,” he purred. “You wouldn’t want me to think you’re worried.”

The smile didn’t fade, not even as Gideon finally twisted his wrist in Mathias’s grasp—not to pull away, but to stay. To make a point.

And then it came, quick and practiced—a sharp flick of his wand, so subtle it might’ve been missed if Mathias hadn’t already been watching him like a hawk. A jinx, small and elegant, designed for one purpose.

Pain.

It wasn’t enough to cripple, just enough to make nerves sing like they’d been set alight. A pinprick spell, dancing just beneath Mathias’s skin, igniting each synapse like sparks catching dry tinder. Subtle. Elegant. Cruel.

Gideon’s voice stayed sweet. “You forget my colors. I'm no snake, I'm a badger. Funny thing about badgers,” he mused. “Despite their unassuming facade, their bite and claw is rather devastating.”

And there it was—that flicker, that break in the mask. Not the childish innocence Gideon paraded around the school, not even the sly cunning he played at when it suited him. No. This was the predator peeking through—the one that didn’t mind blood on his hands if it meant proving a point. If it meant a break from this monotony. The greatest difference between Gideon and Mathias was not their alignment, their heart or even their nature, it was their aspiration. Mathias was cruel for a purpose, Gideon did not require the same prerequisites.

The spell lingered, dancing along Mathias’s nerves, before Gideon finally released him. Not with a shove, but with a deliberate, measured step back.

“I’m not dragging you anywhere, big brother,” he said, and there was something colder now, sharp enough to cut. “You’ve been wading through mud since the day you decided to carry that overdone girl on your arm like a trophy. What was it you told father?” He let out a mocking laugh.

His eyes—so wide, so blue, so sweet—narrowed.

“And we both know you’d bleed for her.”

He tilted his head, mocking. “But would she bleed for you?”

The question hung, twisting the knife before Gideon stepped further away—just far enough to be out of reach. His hands folded behind his back, a mask of childish innocence creeping back over his features.

“I’d be more worried about that than whatever you think I’m doing.”

But he didn’t leave.

Not yet.

Because Gideon didn’t run. Not from Mathias, not from this.

Instead, he smiled again—slow and sharp—as if daring Mathias to take another step. Because this was the game. And Gideon had every intention of winning.

Mathias’s breath came in sharp, shallow pulls. Not that he’d ever let it show—no, his expression was as polished as his shoes, as sharp as the cut of his coat. He was a Pride, after all, and weakness wasn’t something men like him were allowed.

But his fingers betrayed him. They curled into fists as the spell burned across his nerves, a hundred tiny fires sparking under his skin. His jaw tightened, biting down the hiss that threatened to slip free. Pain was nothing. Pain was fleeting. Pain could be controlled.

Gideon’s smile—soft and hollow, all candy-coated edges hiding jagged glass—was far worse.

And Mathias hated him for it.

Hated the way he didn’t flinch. The way he didn’t back down. The way he looked through him like he already knew.

Knew.

It churned, that thought, bile creeping up Mathias’s throat as Gideon’s words slithered around his neck and squeezed. He knew—of course, he knew. He knew Winnie didn’t love him. He knew Winnie would leave him. She’d pack her pretty little bags and slip out like a whisper the first chance she got because Mathias wasn’t enough. Not strong enough. Not good enough. Just like his mother.

His mother who walked out the door and never looked back.

Not once.

And this? This was why. When he was not good enough to earn his father's affection. Earn the name that Giddy was simply given at birth. That pitiful, mewling Aamon was just handed by the virtue of existing. He mattered so little. Was treated as so much less before he even knew he was supposed to be fighting.

Then there were those like Gideon—sharp and cruel, and so goddamn certain. Those who didn’t need silk ties and polished smiles and perfect shows to hold their power. Those who didn’t have to beg to be noticed. Hell, did not want to be noticed. Did not care.

His brother was younger, smaller, less. Or he should’ve been. But Gideon wasn’t less. Not here. Not with that spell still singing through Mathias’s veins, not with that smile cutting him open and leaving him raw.

Mathias’s breath rattled as he swallowed it all down. The fear, the humiliation, the hatred. He smothered it beneath the weight of control—because that’s what he was. Controlled. Always.

Even now.

Especially now.

He stepped closer, slower, measured. If his legs trembled, he didn’t let it show. If his fingers still twitched from the aftershock of the spell, he tucked them behind his back. Don't show weakness. Never scream. He reminded himself.

“Bleed for her?” His voice was quiet, cutting through the space between them like a scalpel. “I already have.”

His eyes flickered, sharp and cold, but something underneath—something ugly—flickered too. “And I’ll bleed again.”

Because it was never about Winnie.

Not really.

Not about her red hair and her sweet little smiles and her trembling hands when he held her too tightly. Not about the way she looked at him—fearful and soft, always soft.

It was about what she represented.

Obedience. Submission. A promise.

That this time, this one time, someone would stay.

And Mathias wouldn’t let Gideon take that from him.

Not his brother with his sharp eyes and sharper tongue, with his smiles that bled cruelty and a heart that knew no hesitation. Not someone who’d never had to beg for devotion.

Because Mathias knew what that was like.

To beg.

And if he had to kill for it—bleed for it—he would.

His hand shot out, faster than he knew he was capable, tangling itself in the collar of Gideon’s shirt and yanking. Slamming him against the wall hard enough that the wood groaned beneath the impact.

Mathias leaned in close—close enough that his breath ghosted against Gideon’s cheek, sharp and shallow, edged with rage. Close enough that the fear in his stomach twisted into something sharp and hot and ugly.

“You think you’re untouchable,” he hissed. “You think you can get away with—whatever this is?”

The sound that left him was halfway between a laugh and a snarl.

“But you’re just like the rest of us, Giddy.” His fingers tightened. “You bleed too.”

He had his wand, he didn’t need it.

Because Mathias wasn’t like Gideon. He didn’t need spells and tricks and cruelty hidden behind soft smiles. Mathias used force. He used fear.

And right now, that’s exactly what he wanted Gideon to feel.

Fear.

But that was the problem, wasn’t it?

Gideon didn’t feel fear.

And Mathias could already see it in his eyes.

That’s when he knew—when he saw the flicker of something dangerous there—that he’d made a mistake.

A very big mistake.

The impact rattled through Gideon’s spine, a sharp crack against the wall as Mathias’s hands twisted in his shirt and held him there. Tight. Desperate. Shaking.

For a moment, Gideon didn’t move.

Didn’t flinch.

Didn’t breathe.

Gideon let Mathias have it. Gideon let Mathias pour every drop of rage, every shred of panic into that grip—because it was panic, wasn’t it? Raw. Wild. The kind of fear that turned men into monsters. The kind of fear that made them claw and bite and burn just to keep what they thought belonged to them. What they needed to belong to them.

And Mathias?

Mathias was terrified.

It was there in the tension of his knuckles, in the flicker of his eyes, the crack in his voice. It was there in the way he pressed in closer, too close, because he needed it—needed to feel bigger. Stronger. In control.

It was pathetic. He was acting like a muggle, not a wizard. That pink bitch was rubbing off on him.

Gideon’s lips twitched—just a little. Not a smile, not really. Just a flicker of something dark and sharp and hungry.

“You think I bleed?” His voice, his true voice came soft, almost a whisper, as if saying it too loud might shatter the moment. Might break Mathias altogether. “Maybe.”

The word hung there, light as air but heavy enough to make the floorboards groan.

“But you, Mathias?”

His head tilted. A shift, subtle and slow, like a predator eyeing its prey. Calculating. Cold.

“You’re already bleeding.”

It was true.

Gideon had seen it—seen it pouring out of him from the moment he walked in.

Fear.

Doubt.

Desperation.

It clung to Mathias’s skin, soaked into every word, every touch, every look he cast at Winnie like he was drowning and didn’t even know it. And Gideon?

Gideon smelled blood.

“Do you really think she loves you?” The words fell like knives, sharp and deliberate. His lips curled. Cruel. Poisoned. “Or do you think she stays because she’s too afraid to run?” They both knew it was the later. When the potions stopped working, he resorted to brutish threats, like he was some muggle thug.

He leaned closer—too close. Close enough to feel the breath catch in Mathias’s throat.

“She flinches when you touch her. Did you know that?”

A lie. Maybe. But Gideon didn’t need truth—not when he had doubt.

He let it linger, let it twist itself deep into Mathias’s ribs and burrow there.

“She looks at you like she’s waiting to be told what to do. Like she’s afraid to step out of line. Like a trapped animal.”

He lifted the scarf he had wrapped around his neck that he wore like a silly badge of honor.

"She came to me of all people begging for an escape."

Gideon’s voice dropped lower, softer—deadly.

“She is just like your mother.”

And there it was.

He felt it the moment it hit, the way Mathias’s shoulders stiffened, the way his breath stuttered.

Weak.

So weak.

“You couldn’t keep mother either, could you?” Gideon’s lips barely moved, but the words sank like teeth. “Not when she went mad. Not when she saw you for what you are. Saw how small you are. And she left.”

He felt the tremor before it hit, the snap of rage like thunder in the air—but he was ready.

Always ready.

Gideon moved fast. Faster than Mathias expected. Faster than someone that small was supposed to move.

His hands shot up—not to shove, not to push, but to twist. Fingers curling like hooks, yanking Mathias’s wrists away from his shirt in one sharp, practiced motion. Breaking the hold.

And then he turned it. He could feel the snap of bone in his hand. The strange, audible noise, somehow both sharp and dull. The sensation of parting beneath flesh, hidden from sight.

He did not stop.

In a flash, Gideon shoved him back—hard.

Mathias hit the wall with a dull thud.

Before he could recover, Gideon was there, pressing in close. Crowding. Smothering.

But this wasn’t desperation.

This was control.

It always had been.

“Don’t you ever put your broken hands on me again.”

His voice wasn’t loud. It didn’t need to be. It was steady. Cold. Final.

Gideon’s hands moved—slowly, deliberately—and Mathias flinched. Flinched.

Good.

But Gideon didn’t hit him. Didn’t strike.

Instead, he smoothed down the front of Mathias’s shirt, fixing the wrinkles like a mother fussing over her child.

“Look at you,” Gideon whispered, his fingers trailing up to tap—tap—tap against Mathias’s jaw. It was as if a switch was turned, the sweet yet hollow voice spoke in place of the one that carried honest menace. “Shaking.”

And then he smiled.

Not the soft, sweet smile he wore around Winnie. Not the wide-eyed innocence he showed to teachers and strangers.

This smile was wrong.

Sharp. Hungry. Cruel.

“You don’t have to worry, big brother.” His fingers trailed back down, patting Mathias’s chest like a promise. “I’ll take good care of her.”

And then—just like that—he stepped back.

Turned.

Walked away.

And Mathias let him.

Mathias stayed against the wall longer than he should have.

His breath came shallow, sharp—ragged. He was still. Too still. Except for his eyes. They tracked Gideon’s every movement like a wolf watching another predator—one more dangerous than himself.

And there it was.

Gideon's footsteps receded into nothingness.

Gone.

And yet, Mathias didn’t move.

Not at first.

Not until the tension in his shoulders collapsed and left him gripping the stone wall like it might swallow him whole if he let go.

Gideon’s words echoed like whispers in his head. She flinches when you touch her.

The comparison burned.

Not when she saw you for what you are. Saw how small you are. And she left.

It burned because it was true.

And that? That terrified him more than the boy who’d just walked out of the room.

He closed his eyes, let the mask slip for just a moment—the fear, the doubt curling like smoke in his chest. But only for a moment.

When he opened them again, the fear was gone. Locked away behind something sharper. Colder. Hungrier.

His hands smoothed the wrinkles in his shirt, the faintest tremor still running through his fingers. But he ignored it. Forced it still.

Forced himself to stand straight.

Gideon Athanatos had made a mistake.

A fatal one.

Mathias pressed a hand to his chest, brushing off the memory of Gideon’s touch, his mockery, his words. And then he smiled.

It wasn’t a warm smile. It wasn’t soft.

It was sharp. Calculated.

Gideon thought he was untouchable, but Mathias knew better. Everyone bled.

Even Athanatoses.

Especially Athanatoses.

He could still feel Gideon’s grip, the weight of it, the strength. He wouldn’t forget that—not ever. But it didn’t matter.

Because Mathias didn’t need brute force, even if he had it in abundance. He just wondered where the hell Giddy's came from. It didn't matter. He didn’t need strength.

He had patience.

And he had time.

His gaze flickered toward the door, his expression smoothing into something calm. Collected. Controlled.

Gideon wouldn’t see it coming.

Not yet.

Not until it was too late.

Mathias straightened his cuffs, adjusting them with deliberate care before turning on his heel and walking out of the room. Head high. Chin up.

Because Mathias Pride didn’t lose.

Not to Gideon.

Not to anyone.