Page 91 of His Stolen Omega

Three days passed with him hardly ever leaving the studio. Levi even started bringing his meals upstairs, leaving them on the table. Sometimes, he lingered, other times he pulled up one of the chairs and sat and silently watched for hours.

Elm hardly noticed either way, too engrossed in his work.

He spent hours sketching, drawing up a design only to find it unsatisfactory or immediately think up a better one. There was a feeling he wanted, but the subject matter was rather common, and that was making it difficult to settle on something. For some, that may have been frustrating, but for Elm, that was half the fun.

Churning out potential. Sorting through it. Picking out only the best pieces of himself. In the studio, it didn’t matter who he was, what he was, or even where he was. The whole universe was just him and his art and the alpha he could always sense lurking at the corners of his mind, his scent constantly present in the air.

It took careful care to keep the clay workable. Took planning and structure. This was where he’d always excelled though. Sky had shifted toward pottery, but Elm crafted statues and knicknacks.

The statue he was currently working on was three feet tall and a foot and a half wide at its thickest part. The sleek rabbit had formed simply enough, Elm’s hands guiding the design as it came to him, but smoothing it out to satisfaction had taken forever. Everything had to be perfectly symmetrical as well, no exceptions. It was more modern than most of the smaller pieces he made and sold back home, and vastly different from the Rabbit God, but Elm had long since learned never to fight against the muse that lived in his head.

The creature almost hadn’t fit in the kiln, but he’d somehow managed, and once that had finished, had started the painting process.

Matte white paint coated the entire statue, one that would turn glossy once it was fired again. He gave it silver embellishments, nothing too fancy, wanting to stick with a more elegant vibe.

Elm was almost finished with it when the doubt started to creep in and he realized how dumb the thing was. How pointless.

“What’s wrong, omega?” the alpha spoke from the corner of the room, startling Elm.

He’d forgotten he was there.

“Nothing.” He sighed. “It’s stupid.”

“What is?”

“This.” He motioned to the statue, but picked up the brush he’d been using and kept going. “I hate it.”

“Then why continue?” Levi asked.

He grunted. “Gotta trust the process.”

“What do you plan on doing with it?”

“It’s going in that spot at the foot of the stairs at the second-floor landing,” Elm informed him. “There needs to be a bigger pop of white to make the space more cohesive.”

“Does there?”

“Obviously.”

The alpha chuckled. “And is there a reason you chose this particular creature?”

“You like rabbits.” These questions were beginning to annoy him. “Quiet. I’m almost finished.”

“As you wish.” Levi watched silently the rest of the evening.

Chapter 22:

Something was wrong.

Elm dragged himself groggily out of sleep, a sense of dread prickling at his heightened senses. The other side of the bed was too hot, the air in the room thick and cloying. At first, he lay there taking stock of his body, confused why he felt off, worried his heat was coming. There weren’t any cramps though, and his skin didn’t feel like it was burning. He clenched his nether muscles, but the ache of being empty didn’t sweep over him like it did when he was desperate to be held down and knotted.

He rolled his head, considering waking Levi to tell him something wasn’t right, and ended up gasping and springing up instead.

“Hey!” Elm cupped Levi’s face, breath catching in his throat when he felt how high his temperature was. He shook him, but the alpha gave no reaction. “Levi, wake up!”

There was a glistening sheen of sweat on the alpha, and his brow was pinched. When Elm tossed off the covers, he saw he was clenching his hands into tight fists at his side, hard enough his nails must have punctured through his palms, because the smell of blood was apparent.

“Wake up!” Elm shook him by the shoulders, but all that did was have the alpha’s head lolling. “Shit! Shit! Shit!”