Malachite | L. S [Completed]

16: Most Ardently

[ TW: mentions of past sexual assault/ rape]

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Time spilt like the cruel thing she was as Louis felt his breath being held by her, hazy eyes blinking to understand what Harry had just said.

"You wrote to me?" The words felt like bile in his mouth, every twist of his tongue as though over shards of glass.

The omega shuddered, taking a step away from Louis as his gaze fell to the floor, a painful tear slipping past his malachite eyes. Louis did not know what to do, although he could feel a shadow of a thought erupting inside of him, something he dearly wished was not true. It couldn't be.

"I wrote to you," Harry affirmed as his voice broke into painful flashes of memory before his hands trembled and he closed them into stubborn fists. "I wrote to you for months and each time you returned the letters to me, seal broken and silence in return." And he breathed shallowly, looking up as though accusing Louis but his voice was a shattered cry. "I wrote to you, Louis."

"I received none of your letters." The words did not sit right on his tongue, they did not feel right. Harry wrote to him. Harry, with whom he was mournfully in love. Harry, who was Louis' everything. Harry, who Louis allowed to break his heart more than once. "Whom did you address them to? I was not aware of where I was being taken to, how were you writing to me?"

"I addressed them to you! I wrote to you! Leah told me where you were residing. I wrote to you for months, Louis. Months and months and months I wrote and I waited and I got my heart broken."

"Leah," Louis whispered, his chest tightening. Harry had tears in his eyes as the candles flickered their golden hue in their shimmer, winds growing while the curtains swayed, wrapping around their frozen frames. "Of all people... you trusted Leah."

"I merely wanted to write to you." Harry's voice shattered Louis. He had never heard the omega being so vulnerable. His frame shook as he wrapped his arms around himself, looking away from Louis and at the dying moon that struggled behind the clouds be holding a storm. "I shouldn't have trusted her, should I? I was so hopeless and all I wanted to do was write to you, assure myself that you were alright, that... that you thought of me, too. How foolish of me to trust her," he scoffed at the end, laughing hollowly.

Louis did not know what to say, for he was not able to carry the weight of Harry's confession. Harry wrote to him. Harry wanted to know Louis was doing alright, he wanted the assurance that Louis thought of him. He wanted Louis just as much as Louis had wanted him. Louis' heart broke a little when he realised how much time they had lost, how many moments they could have been each other's if fate had not been so cruel.

"Why? Of all people, why did you trust her?! You never even talked to her before! How could you think I wouldn't return your letters if I had bloody gotten them?!" His voice sliced through the ceiling of their chambers and Louis' chest ached. He felt helpless and bound and paralysed. He could have had everything he had desired, he could have loved Harry completely. But he could not. "You knew I had loved you since forever, most ardently so, I had promised to make you mine all those years ago and yet you questioned my love for you merely for the reason that I did not return your letters. Which, I never received."

"What was I supposed to do, Louis?" Harry screamed, his eyes wide and maniac as he faced him. The winds grew louder and Louis felt his own eyes sting with everything. "You never told me you loved me, you merely spent time with me, and do not tell me you were not sleeping with other omegas at the capital, everyone knew. And when -- when on my nameday you promised you would make me yours, I was certain you were going to confess you loved me too."