Circe Riddle (Book 4)

Chapter 5

TW: Negative words?, mentions of blood and cuts, mentions of drinking, smoking, daggers,

(September- October)

(Mattheo's pov)

I was back in that pitch-black room. Theodore was circling me, throwing low and cruel comments. Each one of them hit me in the chest, each one worse than the last. It was one thing to hear your father you cared nothing about tell you these things- but it was another thing entirely to hear someone you loved say these words to you. I knew it wasn't really him, I tried to stop thinking it was actually him, but no matter how hard I tried all I heard was Theodore's voice and it was beginning to get very hard to keep my mind clear of the things he was saying.

I knew why my father was doing this. He knew I loved Theodore and he was making me feel bad about it- he would never- ever be able to do that. Little did he know Theodore liked me back but he didn't need to know that. At least I thought Theodore liked me back.

"You're delusional if you think I actually like you" Theodore glared at me, speaking as if he was reading my mind- maybe he was "You?" he questioned "No. Who could like you?" He tilted his head "You're nothing more than a pathetic little boy. You cause so much trouble and so much destruction. You're the least favorite child, I'm surprised your father hasn't thrown you out of the house by now" He laughs and this whole thing goes on for hours.

When I get out of it what feels like days later it's to someone shaking me awake "Mattheo?" I hear a voice far off in the distance.

My whole body aches and I just want to let go, I don't want to be in pain any longer, that's all that I'm ever in. Neverending excruciating pain. I want this to all be over.

(Circe's pov)

Mattheo wasn't opening up his eyes. Emmie was shaking him, Thomas at her side, trying to get Mattheo to drink a potion.

It was now October, We hadn't seen Mattheo in a couple of days. We had been looking for him but couldn't find him until now. Thomas and I had both tried to get into his head but none of us could, which was weird considering he was weak and we were powerful. Emmie had told me that his aura was very dark and I tried to siphon the dark magic away but it didn't let me, like something was locking the dark magic to him. I knew he had been in the shadow room of despair as I liked to call it. Maybe he had been there for too long, maybe the voices got to him. Maybe that would have happened to me if that other version of me hadn't come to help me.

"Maybe I could try," Nicholas asked unsurely. Theodore had insisted that he come with us for some reason.

"What can you do that I can't?" I asked and it came out sounding harsher than I wanted

"Uhh" He scratched the back of his neck "Blood magic" He sounded unsure

I raised my eyebrows "You can do blood magic? No one has done blood magic in years and I thought all the books were destroyed because it was deemed to be too dangerous and it caused terrible consequences to the user" my voice went down to a whisper towards the end and I noticed Theodore's eyes widened slightly at Nicholas

"Not all of them. And you told me to study an area of magic, I found the book in my library so I decided to study it- blood magic. Can I at least try"

I nodded my head but didn't say anything. I watched as he came and sat next to Mattheo and Emmie and Thomas backed away a little bit, I stayed right where I was. Nicholas grabbed Mattheos hand lightly and closed his eyes, muttering something under his breath.

Mattheo's eyes snapped open and Nicholas quickly pulled his hand away. Mattheo glanced around the room. I didn't miss how his eyes skipped over Theodore. Mattheo looked back at Nic "What the heck was that?" He asked