To ruin an Omega - Chapter 453: Past, Present, Future

Chapter 453: Past, Present, Future

FIA

Cian guided me up the stairs. His arm stayed firm around my waist, taking most of my weight as my legs threatened to give out beneath me. The exhaustion hit harder now that Aldric was gone. All the adrenaline that had kept me upright drained away, leaving me hollow and shaking.

We reached my bedroom. The door swung open under his hand, and he led me inside. The familiar space wrapped around me like a blanket. Safe, given it was mine.

He lowered me onto the bed with careful movements. I sank into the mattress, my body melting against the sheets.

“You look like shit right now.”

I managed a weak laugh. Trust Cian to be blunt even now. He was not wrong, though. I was still covered in dried blood, soot, and worse.

“But you clearly need the rest more.” He straightened and moved toward the door. “I will leave you be.”

My hand shot out. I caught his wrist before he could step away.

“There is something I want to tell you.”

He stopped and looked down at where my fingers wrapped around his arm.

“I do not need to know.”

The words came gently. Understanding. He moved back toward the bed and sat on the edge, close enough that I could feel his warmth.

“Whenever you are ready, you can tell me.” His free hand covered mine. “No matter what it is, it changes nothing between us. I want you to know that much.”

“I know.”

I did know. It did not matter that I felt it in the bond. But what mattered more was in the way he looked at me, in every action he had taken since we met.

“But I do want to tell you.”

Silence stretched between us. He waited. Patient. His thumb traced small circles against the back of my hand.

“About Alpha Dimitri?”

I nodded. The name alone made my throat tight.

“He is technically…” I stopped and then started again. “Well. Not technically. He is actually my grandfather.”

Cian went very still. I felt his shock pulse through the bond.

“How?”

One word. It was a simple word. But loaded with confusion.

I took a breath and let it out slowly.

“My grandmother was an Omega there. Before Dimitri’s wife, Pauline sold her to Madeline’s father for experiments.”

The words came easier than I expected. Maybe because I had already said some of it to Dimitri. Maybe because holding it inside hurt more than letting it out.

“Pauline believed that my grandmother threatened her position.” I stared at our joined hands. “Perhaps she was right to do so. My grandmother was with child and she… and she…”

The words stuck in my throat.

“Gave birth to my mother.”

Cian’s grip tightened around my hand. He wanted to steady me badly. Keep me grounded.

“Valentine was obsessed with the idea of bringing back the healers from the age of legend. He experimented on both of them.” My voice cracked. “Somehow, my mother did manage to escape. She started her life by my father’s side.”

“Fleshcraft.”

The word hung in the air between us. Heavy and just as damning.

I looked up at him, meeting his eyes.

“I am not—”

“I do not care if you were made from fleshcraft.”

His voice came fierce, cutting me off in absolute.

He needed me to hear and know that it changed nothing. I knew he would hold me tight. But hearing him say the words, it just hit different.

“I do not care if your existence is a sin and breaks the tenets of supernatural society. I will stand by your side and love you.”

The declaration hit me square in the chest. Tears burned behind my eyes.

“Why would you even think that could change anything between us?”

“I knew it could not.”

The admission came quietly.

“I just hate that those were my origins. I hate that my mother held this much and she could not share or get revenge for all she faced.”

My hands curled into fists against the sheets.

“She was right in front of a daughter of the woman who did that to us. She was further tormented and killed by that woman.”

The rage built in my chest. Hot and all-consuming.

“Knowing that Pauline is now dead is not even enough for me.”

Cian stayed silent. He let me speak… Let me pour out everything I had been holding back.

“When I heard that, all that stayed was the hunger that Isabel still breathes.”

My voice dropped lower and went darker.

“If Hazel could not perish, why can’t she?”

The question came out savage.

Bitter.

“To be honest, I have some dark thoughts of getting my own vengeance.”

I looked at him then. I thoroughly searched his face for horror. For disgust. For any sign that he saw me as a monster.

“Am I a monster for thinking like that?”

“No.”

The answer came without hesitation.

“I have worse.”

His arms wrapped around me as he pulled me against his chest. I collapsed into him, and the tears finally came. They poured out of me in great heaving sobs that shook my entire body. Everything I had held back, everything I had pushed down, broke free all at once.

Cian held me through it. His hand stroked my hair while I cried into his shirt. He said nothing. He just held me and let me fall apart, knowing he would help put me back together.

“Everything will be alright.”

His voice rumbled against my ear.

“With time.”

I wanted to believe him. I tried… I tried to let his certainty sink into my bones and ease the ache that had taken up permanent residence in my chest.

Eventually, the tears slowed. Then stopped. I pulled back and wiped at my face with shaking hands.

“I am tired. I want to rest.”

“Yeah.”

He stood and helped me settle properly into the bed. He even pulled the covers up over me.

“I will get an Omega to attend to you.”

I nodded against the pillow. My eyes already felt heavy.

“I am missing my phone too.”

“I will get it to you.” He moved toward the door. “Have some rest.”

“Cian?”

He stopped and then looked back.

“Thank you.”

He smiled. It was small but genuine.

“Always.”

The door closed behind him with a soft click. I let my eyes fall shut. The exhaustion dragged me down fast, pulled me under before I could fight it.

Sleep took me.

***

I woke up sitting in a chair.

The wrongness hit me immediately. This was not my bed. Not my room. I blinked, trying to orient myself, and my eyes landed on the sickbed in front of me.

My mother lay there. The black root-like lesions covered most of her visible skin. They crawled across her face, down her neck, spreading like cracks in glass. The rot had reached its final stages.

But she smiled at me.

“Hello, Fia.”

My breath caught in my throat. Tears formed instantly, blurring my vision.

“Hello… Mum.”

Was this a dream? Or one of those moments where I traveled back through time again? The distinction suddenly felt crucial. Important.

I was going to try to reach for her to see if that barrier was present when her words cut off my train of thought effectively.

“Which year are you from?”

The question made my mind stutter to a halt.

“What?”

She chuckled. The sound came weak but warm.

“You are from the future visiting the past, are you not?”

I stared at her and tried to process what she was saying. It was a confirmation to what I wanted to know.

“So this is not just a dream.”

“I am afraid not.”

Reality crashed into me then and there. I knew this moment. Recognized it with sharp, painful clarity.

This was moments before I came in with the cure. Before I healed her. Before Isabel suffocated her with a pillow while I was away, leading me to believe for the longest time that I had failed her… That I had not saved her.

Selene… This was a gift from the goddess… I could change the past.

The realization sent electricity through my veins. My hands gripped the armrests of the chair in a manner that would have been hard enough to make my knuckles go white. Though nothing happened as the barrier separated me from this space and reality in all the ways that mattered.

“There is something I need to tell you, Mom.”

She shifted slightly against the pillows. Her eyes stayed on my face. She looked so patient as she waited.

“Do tell.”

Where did I even start? How did I warn her about everything that was coming without overwhelming her? Without making her last moments filled with terror instead of peace?

I leaned forward. Closed the distance between us.

“Isabel is going to kill you.”

The words came out blunt. Stark. No way to soften them.

My mother’s expression did not change. She watched me with those knowing eyes, and something in her gaze told me she was not surprised.

“When you leave after healing me?”

I nodded.

“She will come in with a pillow. She will suffocate you.” My voice cracked. “I found you too late, and I was so dumb that I did not realize that it was not the rot that took you. That you would never have been weak enough to leave me without saying goodbye. By the time I came back, you were already gone.”

“I see.”

I hated that those were two words, and they seemed calm and accepting.

It almost felt as if she did not understand the gravity of what I was putting out.

“That is not all.”

I could not stop now. The words poured out of me.

“Isabel is Pauline’s daughter. Pauline, Dimitri’s wife. The woman who sold your mother to Valentine. Maybe you do know that.” I watched her carefully. “But I am certain you do not. So know it now.”

My mother’s eyes closed briefly. When they opened again, I saw pain there. Deep and old and familiar.

“Of course I know that, Fia. I can see the future.”

Her hand moved across the sheets. Reaching for mine. I would have taken it without hesitation. To feel her paper-white thin skin again. But… that barrier held us both back.

“What do you mean… You know…”