CHAPTER 101: CHAPTER 101: RED ETHER

Matteo flinched, his fake sincerity faltering. "That’s not... Elias, I was looking out for you. Victor’s framing me, trying to make you choose him by..."

"Victor?" Elias cut in, disbelief sharpening his tone. "Why would you do it, Matteo? I refused your dates, your attempts to get closer more times than I can count. I thought you’d know me better than this."

Matteo’s mouth opened, but Ashwin’s palm stayed exactly where it was, an unmoving barrier that made the space between them feel like a locked door. "You’ve said enough," Ashwin told him, voice calm but with an edge that left no room for argument.

Elias didn’t wait for a reply. He stepped sideways, forcing Matteo to either move or be brushed aside, and walked on without looking back. Ashwin fell into step beside him, his presence a wall between Elias and the man still standing in the corridor, staring after them.

They were almost to the end of the corridor when Ashwin’s gaze flicked past Matteo’s shoulder.

It wasn’t obvious, just the faint tightening around his eyes, the shift in his weight, but Elias caught it and frowned.

"Go on," Ashwin said smoothly, already steering him toward the corner that led back to the hall. "You’ve still got time to grab a drink before the session starts again."

Elias opened his mouth to argue, but Ashwin’s hand settled lightly at his elbow, the pressure deceptively casual. "Now," he added, and there was something in his tone, subtle but absolute, that made Elias take the hint and move.

Matteo, still half-turned toward him, didn’t notice until Elias was several steps away.

And then the space shifted.

Victor was there, silent, close enough that the faint rise of his breath stirred the hair at the back of Matteo’s neck. He didn’t need to touch him; his presence alone pressed in like a closing fist.

Ashwin didn’t look back. His focus stayed on guiding Elias into the safety of the crowd, where Victor’s temper wouldn’t reach him.

Victor’s voice was low, almost conversational, but it carried the certainty of a verdict already decided.

"You’re not walking away from this."

Matteo froze. There was no misunderstanding the tone. This wasn’t a warning; it was the end of whatever chance he’d thought he still had.

Matteo’s throat worked once, but no sound came. The air felt heavier, every breath dragging like it had to pass through iron.

"You..." he started, but the rest was swallowed by the flicker of red that bled into the edges of his vision. His ether surged up before he could cage it, hot and unsteady, spilling out in jagged bursts that stung the air.

Victor’s gaze dipped once, briefly acknowledging the color, and the corner of his mouth twitched in the kind of interest one might show to a puzzle with a missing piece. "Red ether," he said mildly, as though naming a flower. "I wondered how you’d managed to rot this far without burning out."

Matteo bristled, taking a step forward on instinct, his pulse hammering in his ears. "You think you scare me?"

Victor didn’t bother to answer. He let the silence stretch just long enough for Matteo’s ether to climb higher, unstable tendrils cracking against the air like splintering glass.

"That type," Victor said at last, almost idly, "is the hardest to control. And every fool who tries it dies by design."

"You didn’t die." Matteo spat back.

Victor’s smile was slow, calculating, the kind that made it impossible to tell if he was amused or simply sharpening the knife.

"I’m not a fool," he said, stepping forward until the thin margin of space between them vanished. "I’ve won it’s will. I didn’t just try it like you."

Matteo stiffened. He didn’t need the rest of the words to understand.

"That brief time you lingered near him," Victor continued, his voice a low, deliberate cut, "you weren’t just sniffing around for his attention. You were breathing easier, weren’t you? The burn in your chest dulled. The static in your head quieted. For the first time in years, you thought you could actually survive yourself."

Matteo’s jaw worked, but the flicker of recognition in his eyes was all the admission Victor needed.

"Elias," Victor said, almost indulgent now, "filters it. Strips the poison out of your current, leaving it clean enough to run without killing you. You got a taste of that, and you thought you could keep him close enough to drink from without him noticing."

"I didn’t..."

"You did." Victor didn’t raise his voice, but the weight behind the words crushed the protest flat. "And now?" His smile thinned, razor-sharp. "Now he’s bonded. Wary. And very, very done with you. You’ll never feel that quiet again."

The denial died on Matteo’s tongue, replaced by something uglier: panic wrapped in fury. His ether bucked harder, a mess of red lightning thrashing in the air around them.

Victor stepped into it without hesitation, letting his own red ether coil lazily through Matteo’s like a constrictor tasting prey. "You’re already rotting from the inside. Without him, you’ll burn out. That’s not a threat, Matteo. That’s just the mathematics of what you are."

Something in Matteo’s expression cracked, the first edge of madness sparking behind his eyes. And Victor, man, god, executioner. didn’t put out the fire. He fed it, curious how long Matteo could stand before he fell apart.

Victor didn’t close his hand around Matteo’s throat, he didn’t need to. His ether slipped deeper instead, a slow, invasive spiral that caught on every frayed edge Matteo had left and pulled. The air between them thickened with the dense, metallic taste of red power layered over red power, currents twisting in ways no sane wielder would allow.

Matteo’s breath hitched, his stance faltering as the foreign weight pressed through his channels. His own ether, already unstable, began to spike erratically, fighting and folding in the same instant.

"Do you feel that?" Victor asked softly, almost like a teacher coaxing an answer from a student. "That’s what control feels like. Not your rabid thrashing. Not the endless static you drown in. This..." He let a fresh pulse slide in, heavier, sharper, "is real power."

Matteo’s eyes widened, the panic now riding alongside an involuntary rush, a dangerous cocktail of relief and overload. His fingers curled as if reaching for something just out of sight.

"You could’ve learned to hold it," Victor went on, his tone conversational even as his ether coiled tighter, threading into Matteo’s like barbed wire. "With him. He would’ve kept you steady. Even made you strong."

He leaned in until his breath was warm against Matteo’s ear. "But you wanted more. You wanted to own him."

Victor drove the final pulse straight through the weak seam in Matteo’s control, a surgical break disguised as indulgence.

The sound Matteo made was halfway between a gasp and a choke, his ether detonating outward in jagged, uncontrolled bursts. The red light in his eyes went too bright, too fast, and then fractured, splintering into the raw, manic gleam of someone whose mind had just tipped past the point of return.

Victor stepped back to watch. "There it is," he murmured, as Matteo’s breath turned into ragged laughter that didn’t belong to sanity anymore.