Why me? WHY DID IT HAVE TO BE ME!
Elias forced himself onto unsteady legs, the cold stone biting at his bare feet. Pain flared through his body with every step, but he clenched his jaw and pressed forward.
He had to leave.
The scent clinging to his skin was suffocating, a silent declaration of what had transpired. If anyone saw him like this—
No. He wouldn't allow it.
Fingers tightening around the sheet draped over him, he moved through the dim corridor, each step careful, measured. The walls felt like they were closing in, shadows stretching long under the flickering torchlight. He focused on putting one foot in front of the other, ignoring the sting of torn skin, the dull ache settling deep in his bones.
His mind swirled with a single, bitter truth.
He had tried to stay invisible. Had followed every rule, avoided every gaze. And yet, in the end, it hadn't mattered.
Omegas had no choices.
His stomach twisted. He needed to wash—scrub away the scent, the touch, the memory—before anyone saw him. He couldn't bear the stares, the whispered confirmations of what he already knew.
That he no longer belonged to himself.
Elias moved through the corridors like a ghost, his steps light despite the weight pressing on his body. The sheet clung to his skin, barely enough to shield him from the cold or the shame crawling under his flesh. His heartbeat pounded in his ears, each echo of his footfalls a reminder that he needed to move faster.
The servants' quarters were still a distance away, and dawn was breaking. Soon, the estate would stir to life, and if anyone saw him like this…
His grip on the sheet tightened. He couldn't let that happen.
Turning down a secluded hallway, Elias forced himself toward a small washing chamber meant for low-ranking servants. It wasn't much—just a stone basin with cold water—but it would have to do. He slipped inside, his breath uneven, and shut the door behind him.
The mirror across the room caught his reflection.
He wished it hadn't.
His skin was marked—evidence of last night's claim standing out like bruised ink against pale flesh. The ghost of hands, of lips, of something deeper than just physical pain lingered there. His lower lip was swollen where he'd bitten down too hard. His wrists, where he had struggled, bore faint imprints of fingers that had never needed to try that hard to keep him still.
Elias swallowed down the nausea rising in his throat.
He turned away from the mirror and reached for the basin, plunging his hands into the icy water. It stung, but the cold was grounding, cutting through the haze clouding his mind. He grabbed a cloth and scrubbed, harder than necessary, as if he could erase everything from his skin.
The water darkened.
His breath hitched, but he didn't stop. Couldn't stop.
Even when his skin turned raw, even when his hands shook, even when he felt like he was breaking apart from the inside out—
He kept scrubbing.
The cold water had done little to wash away the heaviness that clung to him. Elias gripped the edge of the basin, his knuckles turning white as the world around him began to blur. The ache in his chest—the crushing weight of everything he had just endured—suddenly became unbearable.
His breath hitched, shallow and erratic. He tried to hold it together, to keep the dam inside him from breaking, but it was too much. His body trembled violently, and his mind spun in a thousand different directions, none of them making sense.
The cloth slipped from his grasp as his hands began to shake uncontrollably.
And then, a sound tore from his throat—a low, guttural cry that seemed to echo through the stone walls of the small chamber. It wasn't just a scream. It was the sound of everything inside him fracturing, all the walls he had so carefully built around himself crumbling in an instant.
Elias didn't try to hold it in.
He let out another heart-wrenching scream, raw and desperate, a sound of anguish so deep it shook his entire being. His knees buckled beneath him, and he collapsed to the floor, tears streaming down his face as the weight of everything crushed him from all sides.
His chest heaved as he gasped for air, but each breath only seemed to make the pain worse, a jagged, insistent reminder of the torment he had just experienced.
He couldn't stop crying.
It was as if the floodgates had opened, the flood of emotion spilling over him like a torrent he couldn't control. The anger, the humiliation, the fear—everything came crashing down, a relentless storm.
Elias curled into himself, his body shaking uncontrollably as he wept, each sob a desperate cry for the release he couldn't find.
The cold, unforgiving stone floor beneath him offered no comfort, no reprieve from the chaos inside.
It felt like his soul was shattering into pieces.
And he didn't know if he could put it back together again.
Elias curled tighter into himself, his body trembling violently as his mind spiraled. His chest heaved with each frantic breath, yet nothing could stem the overwhelming flood of emotions crashing through him.
His hands clutched his head, pressing against the pain, but it wouldn't go away. It never went away.
"I'm worthless… I'm worthless… I'm worthless…" The words slipped out of his mouth, over and over again, a mantra that dug deeper with every repetition. Each time he spoke it, it felt more true.
He hadn't even been strong enough to avoid it. He hadn't been able to escape.
"Why did it have to be me? Why me…?" He muttered between ragged breaths, his voice cracking.
Why me?
The words seemed to echo off the stone walls, like they were mocking him, dragging him further into the abyss of his own mind. There was no escape from the truth that had sunk its teeth into him—he was nothing more than an object.
The thought kept spiraling. Worthless, unimportant, discarded.
His body continued to shake with every sob that racked through him. His throat burned from the cries, but he couldn't stop.
"I'm worthless… worthless… worthless…" He repeated the words like a chant, each time harder to speak, each time more suffocating.
The tears kept coming, mixing with the grime on his skin as if they could cleanse him, but they only served to remind him of his degradation.
The pain felt endless. It was like something inside him had broken, and he could do nothing but let it happen.
Elias choked on a sob, his fingers digging into his scalp as if he could pull himself out of the suffocating spiral, but the thought persisted, the words relentless.
He wasn't meant to be anything but this.
He wasn't meant to be seen, to be cared for.
He was worthless.