Chapter Text
It rains often at the cabin.
Hoseok sloshes through a particularly deep puddle right at the foot of the steps, his steps heavy and loud. He winces when the water creeps up and soaks through his pant leg- he has always hated the feeling of thick, wet wool. His socks have been soaked through for a while now, but he has thus-far chosen to ignore it. There is still a lot of work to do around the house, unfortunately. He knows somewhere in his heart of hearts that there is no possible way to get it all done comfortably. However, Hoseok is used to this. He’s long since learned how to suck it up.
He can barely feel his toes, now. He’s sure they must resemble wrinkled little raisins.
He sighs. His breath hits the air in the form of a smoky, white mist. Winter is fast approaching the mountains, and Hoseok is not sure if he’s ready to give it a warm welcome just yet.
The omega throws the old blue tarp back over the pile of wood that lines the edge of his porch, and he secures it to the ground using two large, heavy stones. This way, he won’t have to worry about the wind grabbing it in the middle of the night, or about any unwanted visitors making a home there for themselves. Hoseok doesn’t think his preventative care is completely unwarranted- last week, he had forgotten to cover the wood and had inadvertently invited a disgruntled raccoon for a night’s stay.
Hoseok shivers involuntarily before leaning down and hoisting a parcel of firewood tied together with tough, woven twine over his shoulder. His knees bend with the weight. He is almost knocked off balance for a second, and he swears, digging his heels into the squishy, muddy grass to steel himself. Hoseok grits his teeth. The wood may be heavy, but he needs to start burning it before the sun sets.
Late autumn nights are brutal here.
His new home is a cabin that had been left to him in his grandfather’s will, and to say it needed some work would be a severe understatement.
Hoseok didn’t mind the idea of living in an old house. However, he did mind the idea of living under a leaky roof. He has a plethora of things he wants to finish by the time the first snow hits home. The insulation needs to be replaced. He also wants to fix up the wood paneling on the exterior walls, but that can wait until the snow melts in the spring.
Hoseok already has a list of all sorts of things he wants to plant in the yard written down and tacked to the fridge with a big, chunky magnet. Spring hold hope in her warm, delicate palms for Hoseok- he already knows that the winter months are going to be rough on him and this house tucked deep in the woods.
He’s already stocked the pantry for the next few months. The icebox in the cellar is already full of salted meat- the pantry is full of non-perishables.
he wants to make the old place feel like home- like a den, or something like that. Hoseok is an omega, after all. Of course he’d try to make this place feel more like somewhere he’ll be permanently. Even if taking on the responsibility of renovating a house wasn't very typical of someone of his sub gender, he has lots of plans.
Hoseok hasn’t ever been so easily accepting of the unspoken rules of his presentation. He likes to work hard. He always has. Even when he had worked a “normal-person” office job, he had worked hard- if not a little too hard- perhaps that’s why he felt as if he was burnt up to a crisp, now. Before he started feeling this way- like something was weighing him down, heavy on his shoulders and his mind- he liked the satisfaction that followed a long day’s work. He liked feeling like he did something.
He supposes that it would be easier to do all of this if he had a partner, someone to split the work with. Maybe someone to warm the bed for him after a long day. Hoseok has never had a preference of sub gender. Whether they be an alpha, beta, or omega, Hoseok doesn't mind. Just as long as his partner loves him, Hoseok would be content. That’s all he cares for.
Hoseok huffs, stepping up the rickety stairs with big, thudding steps. He can’t wait to kick his thick, rubber-toed boots off at the door. That’s all he can think of as the wet cold seeps deeper into his bones. He feels stiff, almost like he could freeze if he stays still for too long.
He doesn’t think to look down before he steps into the doorway.
He flinches when he feels his toe nudge something squishy on the doormat, and the parcel of wood slips off his shoulder and hits the floor with a heavy thud. The crash echoes, the sound bouncing off the trees that line the yard and stretch outwards for miles on end.
A squirrel. Its blood is matted to its fur already, and Hoseok frowns deeply. It was a fat little thing- almost perfectly sized.
It’s a shame that it died. A waste, even. If he had seen it earlier, he would have shot it himself. All meat is good meat, and Hoseok is pretty sure there’s a notecard for a good squirrel soup hidden in one of the cluttered kitchen drawers inside the cabin.
He grabs blindly at the shovel that is propped up against the railing. The wooden rails are long past needing replaced- some of them have already been eaten away by rot. They stretch around the porch, which wraps around the left side of the cabin. Hoseok doesn't even want to think of how long it may take for him to get around to fixing them up.
The metal handle of the shovel is cold to the touch- warped, dented, and very well-used. Hoseok knows that he’s going to have to learn to love the thing once the first snow falls.
He sighs. It must have been a cat, or something. A cat, surely.
Hoseok’s lips quirk up at the thought of a small, fuzzy creature liking him enough to leave him gifts. He wonders if he should leave a bowl of water out on the porch for the stray, or if he should travel into town when he has the chance for a few cans of food. He wouldn’t mind trying to befriend the little guy. Hoseok is lonely.
I’ve always wanted a cat , he muses as he scoops the prone little body of the squirrel onto the lip of his shovel, gently. He makes his way down the steps again and around the side of the cabin. The wet cold mud that is seeping up between the dead grass rises up around the soles of his rubber boots, like it wants to swallow him whole.
He buries it under the bare rhododendron bush.
__
The next morning, after putting the kettle on the stove to boil, he opens the door to find two squirrels.
Two.
Hoseok’s back straightens a bit, and he nervously scans the tree line. It splits into two at the end of the gravel road, stretching into a thicket of evergreens. The sun is barely up, but the birds are chirping from the treetops. Good morning, good morning. Hoseok notes absently that it’s colder than it was yesterday. He wonders why the birds haven't left for the winter yet, fleetingly, but he figures that the cold weather had hit the mountains earlier this year. The earth promised them a long, bitter winter. The birds were probably as unprepared as he was at this point.
He drops his gaze back to the squirrels.
One squirrel he could pass as being a fluke, but two? He can’t imagine a cat dragging two squirrels to his doorstep. It feels too… deliberate.
He kneels, studying the fuzzy bodies with morbid fascination. These ones look less torn up. Hoseok may be a city wolf, but he knows an arrow’s wound when he sees it. Instead of an eye, there is a bleeding, dark hole gaping up at him. The wounds are identical on both of the kills. Hoseok's throat seizes up with anxiety. At first, it doesn’t really register, though. The more he studies the squirrels- looking, but never reaching out and touching them with his hands- the more he feels his skin crawl. Hoseok grabs for the shovel he had left beside the door the night prior, and he shakily prods one of the bodies with the lip of it.
He repeats the action to the other until they both lie on their little backs. Now Hoseok can see them properly, and they look cleaned and gutted. The cuts are precise- very straight and very clean. Their empty chest cavities glare up at him, both a sickening shade of red. That’s not-
That’s not the work of a cat.
It’s clearly the work of very sharp knife in very steady hands.
Cats don’t shoot arrows. Cats don’t clean their kill.
Humans do. Wolf shifters do.
Hoseok rises, shakily, and shuts the door immediately. He pulls the deadbolt close with a nearly silent shick.
__
Hoseok twiddles with the car keys.
He wonders if it would be safe to make the drive down the mountain this late in the year. The first snowfall should be coming any day now, and he doesn’t want to get stranded in-town by accident, or worse, on the way to town. It’s about an hour to and from on the winding dirt road. Sure, he probably has a full gas tank, but the Jeep is old. He doesn't really trust it all that much, especially not in the cold.
The deadbolt has been locked since the morning prior, though. Hoseok is afraid to open it again, admittedly, but he will have to gather more wood soon. The fire in the hearth grows weaker and weaker as the hours pass, and his wood pile is starting to look a bit sparse. He doesn't want to wait until nightfall, either.
Hoseok deposits the keys back into the bowl sitting on the kitchen counter, and he presses his back against the old, rounded refrigerator door. He doesn't want to take the time to check the tires or potentially refuel the tank out there, right now. He doesn't feel safe. He doesn’t even want to think about how difficult wrapping the tires in chains would be alone, like this.
It’s eerily silent, and suddenly, Hoseok finds himself wishing he wasn’t alone, here.
“Maybe I should have kept the office job,” Hoseok mutters to himself, but it feels weird to speak. He hasn't spoken out loud in maybe a week- and that fact sort of startles him.
He had always been the outgoing type. What had changed?
Hoseok pinches the bridge of his nose and hopes that whatever is outside will be kept outside by the deadbolt. He had even checked the windows, making sure that all of the locks were fully operational. It’s all he could do, really.
He had even strapped a hunting knife to his belt, the weight of it heavy against his thigh. It’s a curved blade with a slightly serrated edge- he’s sure it was used in the past to gut deer or larger game by his grandfather. Hoseok, however, hasn't used it for much other than cutting the twine that fastens his firewood together. He feels safer with it close to him, though.
Hoseok knows in his heart that if something like- like an alpha wanted to get in, it would. The flimsy little window locks and Hoseok’s buck knife wouldn’t stop anything from happening.
The fire cracked in the fire pit across the cabin, the flames struggling to catch onto the already-charred wood. He knows that he’s going to have to go out and retrieve wood from the pile- just one of the bundles he had already prepared a few weeks ago.
He doesn’t know what he’d do if he hadn’t already chopped the wood. Hoseok doesn’t want to be outside for more than he absolutely has to.
He grits his teeth. The sun is out, but it’s bitterly cold. It provides him no warmth- the light is cold, and the air is even colder.
Hoseok grabs the thick wool cardigan hanging on the back of the kitchen chair and throws it over his shoulders, fastening the button at his throat. He doesn’t bother pulling his arms through it. It’d be nice if he had a fur, something heavy that would retain his body heat. The cardigan will do for now though- it’s not like Hoseok can easily take down a bear or any animal large enough to provide a skin and fur to fashion a heavy cloak from by himself.
Or maybe he’s just an omega. Maybe he wants someone else to provide him a fur, someday.
He shakes his head. Thoughts like that were best left in the city. Hoseok is alone now- or at least, he’s as alone as an omega being stalked by something in the woods can be.
__
When Hoseok opens the front door, hand locked around his blade, he staggers backwards. His stomach twists into knots.
One, two, three, four, five, six, seven.
Seven squirrels, neatly lined up on the doormat.
Hoseok gags, the anxiety crawling up his throat almost immediately. The fear- it’s so extreme that he feels as if he could throw up. His vision tunnels, suddenly. His fingers dig into the wood frame of the door, hard enough that the skin at his fingertips pale to paper white. His fingernails press painfully into the hard surface.
Frantic, Hoseok props himself up with his arm and scans the tree line, the hair on the back of his neck sticking straight up. He wonders, helplessly, if he will have enough reception inside the cabin to make a short call down the mountainside. He wonders if anyone would even come help him, just someone to come escort him out so he won't have to travel alone. Hoseok doesn’t use his cellphone much, these days. He doesn't have a reason to.
Now, he does.
The first snow is swirling in the air, now. The flakes look dense enough to stick, and the forest is quiet.
Hoseok can't see anything in the tree line, and it worries him. He can’t see anyone or anything, but he is sure he can feel eyes on him.
Calm down. He tries to rationalize with himself. There is nothing there. You just need firewood. Don’t touch the squirrels, just grab the firewood. That’s all you need.
It takes everything in Hoseok to step out from the inside of the cabin. He still keeps his hand locked around the knife on his belt, tightly. He steps over the seven bodies, all cleaned and shot perfectly, and practically launches himself down the rickety stairs. He’s reckless, really. He doesn't think about the ice that could have formed overnight. Hoseok hadn't laid out any salt to prevent it from forming, after all.
That is his first mistake.
His feet slip.
He misses the last step, and he goes crashing down. He shrieks, horrified.
All of the air is knocked from his lungs as he hits his right side off the near-frozen ground. His hands do nothing to catch his fall. The omega skids in the mud, his trousers now streaked black with sludge.
Hoseok can’t breathe.
The firewood. I need the firewood!-
He groans in pain, wheezing as he tries to pull himself upright. He rolls onto his knees, his back left exposed and unprotected as he feels his forehead hit the ground, weakly. He tries to make himself as small as possible.
Hoseok can’t think straight. He wheezes through a breath and feels the way his lungs reject the air.
The fear sparks like a flint against the bones of ribcage. The pain flares, consuming his chest in red-hot flames. His vision tunnels against his will. He claws at the ground, his fingernails digging into the mud desperately as he wheezes. He feels feral, somehow. He feels like he would do anything to survive, right now.
His hands are covered in slippery mud. The dark earth is smeared down the sleeves of his cardigan. He feels dirty.
Something rustles in the thick, barren brush that lines the property’s edge, and Hoseok feels his skin crawl.
“No,” Hoseok cries, the tears pebbling at his waterline, and he falters as he grabs for his knife. His hands shake so violently that the blade knocks against the leather sheath repeatedly. Scrambling, the omega tries to get back onto his feet, but he fails , the soles of his boots slipping slipping slipping in the mud as he scuttles towards the woodpile. Hoseok is still very close to the ground, crouched, and the sticky smell of wet earth clogs his nose- it is everywhere .
His fingers sink into the earth, soggy and freezing.
He lunges for the woodpile, again.
This time he does not miss.
He reaches underneath the blue tarp that protects the pile, knocking one of the stones he had placed on the corners away. He tugs two bundles of wood free. The adrenaline feels like electricity, almost. He feels it surge through his body like a bolt of lightning. He digs his heels into the ground and steps backwards, quick. His heartbeat pounds in his ears.
He presses the tied bunches of firewood to his chest, the rough bark digging into the skin of his palms and through his shirt. Hoseok’s vision teeters, suddenly, and it’s like the world is spinning.
He still can’t see anything in the woods, but he knows something is there. Hoseok crouches, completely still, as fear locks his body in place.
Something in the brush rustles, again.
Hoseok tries to calm his breathing, but he’s sure any predator within a five-mile radius would be able to smell his pure, unfiltered omegan distress. His knees sink in the mud slowly, soaking through the thick denim of his trousers. He stares helpless into the thick of dense branches. The wood all seems to blend in together- the grey-brown of barren trees and trunks and brittle brush and deep, deep greens that are almost black streak in his vision.
A blur of brown and white darts across the yard.
Hoseok flinches so hard he’s sure he’ll be left concussed before he registers what he saw.
A rabbit. It was a goddamn rabbit- and he had let it get away.
The handle of his knife cuts into his sweaty palm. What a hunter he was. The embarrassment washes over him like ice water. Hoseok grits his teeth, his grip on the firewood he had fought so valiantly for tightening against his chest.
He’s glad that no one had to see that- hopefully.
“Regardless, you did well, Hoseokie,” he mumbles to himself lowly, trying to soothe himself in the only way he knew best. He clears his throat, “brush it off, now, omega. You did well. You did well.”
The self-praise feels sour on his tongue.
He hurries to the wood pile again, once he’s sure that it was only a rabbit. He throws the tarp over it and secures it in place again after pulling two more sets of wood free. He tries not to think of how he had acted, but the mud sticking to his skin and clothes is a constant reminder.
As much as he tries not to dwell on it, he knows that he would have died if he had been ambushed.
The omega tries not to look at squirrels lined up on his porch when he shuffles up the stairs again. His arms are full of enough firewood to last him for the next week or so. Their beady, black void-eyes stare right up at him- unblinkingly judgmental, even in death.
Hoseok averts his eyes and steps over them again.
__
Three nights later, Hoseok is interrupted by three distinct knocks on his front door.
That can’t be right.
Hoseok stares, wide-eyed, ignoring the way the kettle on the stove begins to scream at him. The whistle splits his ears. He couldn’t bring himself to care, though. He braces himself on the counter, his whole body stiff with anticipation.
Rap rap rap rap rap rap rap.
The sound of knuckles hitting the wood door is almost drowned out by the screech of the boiling water. Hoseok finally jolts back into existence, suddenly, and rushes to turn the gas off on the stove. The gas clicks at him, chirping like a bird until it dies out.
The kettle’s frustrated scream quiets down slowly, but otherwise, it’s dead silent in the cabin.
Hoseok is certain that there is someone standing on the porch.
He weighs the pros and cons silently. What if it’s one of the townspeople? A family member? Hoseok wonders if any of his city friends would want to take the drive up the mountains, considers it before-
Before he remembers that the first snow has already fallen, and it hasn’t stopped. There is no way that anyone had been able to make the trek up the trails unless they had brought the snowplow up with them.
There is someone standing on the porch, and Hoseok doesn’t know who it is. His hand finds its way to his deep jean pocket, slowly, and his hand curves around his favorite buck knife.
He’s good friends with it, now. They sleep together every night. Hoseok doesn’t let it out of his sight. The leather wrapped around the handle is soft with age, but the blade is sharp and pristine.
Hoseok feels his wolf- the omega- come alive under his skin.
Rap. Rap. Rap.
Again. Again. Again.
Hoseok knows that he is not going to be able to hide from this for much longer. He swallows drily around nothing as he inches his way to the front door.
His fingers tighten impossibly around the handle of knife.
There’s a cold draft that’s been slowly sinking into the room from under the door, and with that, Hoseok can recognize a distinctly potent scent of pine. An alpha scent.
Alpha. There is unknown alpha on his porch. This alpha leaves him primitive gifts when he’s sleeping. There is an unknown alpha on his porch who smells of pine, and he’s knocking on Hoseok’s front door as if he’s a friend stopping by for a visit.
Hoseok may be a grown man, but he is very, very afraid.
Hoseok sucks in a breath and tries not to let the pure, unbridled panic swallow him whole. His body takes over for him. He doesn’t really mean to unlock the deadbolt with his free hand, but it happens very, very quickly. The door handle makes a very distinct snick as it is unlocked.
He’s going against all reason. He shouldn’t be opening the door- he should barricading it close.
Hoseok doesn’t really know what he’s doing.
He pushes the door open. The wind whistles in his ears, its force rough against the side of his poor, little cabin.
And no one is there.
__
The next few weeks are lived in what Hoseok understands to be full-blown bouts of extreme anxiety.
He scratches the skin on his forearms completely raw. He doesn’t really feel the pain of it- of the scratching that leaves him running all red and bloody- in those moments. There’s a morbid sort of fascination that comes with scraping up the dry, flaking skin until it peels under his fingernails.
A hollow sort of numbness settles over him- over his brain, and the way he processes his fear. Hoseok knows that this is bad, but he can’t help it.
Scratching himself bloody distracts him from the footsteps he hears outside the cabin.
It started two days after he locked himself up. He had moved as much wood as he was physically able to inside the house one morning. He had worked so diligently. There’s enough wood to last him a month or two. The salted meats kept in the icebox will last him awhile, as well.
Hoseok is fine. He is perfectly okay- he’s set for the worst of the winter. That doesn’t make him feel safe though. He knows that there’s an alpha that has been circling the property for weeks, now.
Hoseok had not been warned of wolf people in the woods, but it’s evident that this is what the person was. A wolf- a true shifter, unlike Hoseok and his modern ways. Hoseok could count on his hand how many times he had shifted forms, and all had been done in his childhood. He isn’t even sure can shift, or even if he could out of self-defense alone.
When Hoseok isn’t holed up in the nest he had wedged in between the rickety old bed frame and the wall, he checks the locks on his doors and windows. He does it borderline obsessively, on clockwork. He circles the small cabin and its three rooms. He pulls the drapes closed, darkness bouncing off all of the surfaces of the room. He wonders, sometimes, if he could live in the cellar- but it’s too cold, now. The dark wouldn’t bother him, but the damp cold would. He would get sick. He wishes that he didn’t need to light the fire every morning in order to survive.
Most of all, he regrets moving here all alone.
Hoseok finds that even though he knows that there is a wolf on his property, he has never felt as alone.
__
Hoseok wakes to the metallic smell of blood. The omega’s eyes sting with it.
Hoseok fidgets in his nest, his throat closing shut with fear. It must be fear, but Hoseok isn’t sure- Hoseok is not sure of he has felt any other emotion but fear in days- weeks, even. He's lost count.
The air still smells of blood- fresh blood.
The scent of it is dizzying. Hoseok starts to cry, because he knows that eventually, he’s going to have to search for the source- before it starts to rot. Hoseok knows that rot brings illness, and Hoseok can’t afford to get sick when he’s all alone up here like this.
He has no way out of here, even if he wanted to leave- if he gets sick, he’s going to have to grit his teeth and bear it. If he gets sick, he’s going to have to make sure he doesn’t do anything stupid, like dying.
The snow must have piled higher and higher as the days turned to weeks. There is no way he could get the Jeep down the mountain and into town in one piece- he knows in his heart that he’s stuck here, and it wouldn’t be until at least the beginning of March for the snow to melt down. The spring is even cold- they'll still get snow, but as the seasons change, the ground will get warmer.
He hasn’t dared to pull the curtains to check outside. He doesn’t think he has the courage to do so.
Hoseok worries at the scabs on his forearms, his fingernails digging into the barely healed spots. Logically, he knows if he continues to do this, he’s going to get an infection.
“Check the locks,” he mutters to himself. The air is frigid inside the cabin. The coals must have died while he was sleeping. He’ll eventually restart the fire before the cold bites all feeling from his toes and fingers. “It’s time to check the locks.”
Checking the locks makes him feel safer, even though they’re brittle and rusted and old. Checking the locks puts a smidge of control back into Hoseok’s hands- a ghost of control. Even Hoseok knows that checking the locks is a useless practice.
The scent of iron seems to stick to his skin as he moves out of his compact, cramped little nest. The floorboards creak underfoot. The floor is cold when his palms make contact with it. His feet are cold. So, so cold, and Hoseok can’t help it when he stumbles. He’s lost all feeling them, his hands too. He doesn’t know why the fireplace went out, but he’s sure that this is the type of cold that kills.
Hoseok drags himself through the small cabin and beelines directly to the front door.
The locks look untouched, but the smell of iron is getting heavier and heavier with every step he takes. Hoseok knows that whatever it is, it’s coming from the front porch. It’s coming from the front door, from the porch.
Hoseok’s breathing slows as the anxiety takes him in a chokehold. The tears feel frigid on his face, his lips dry and his eyelashes sticking together from the salt.
You have to open the door, Hoseokie.
Hoseok’s bare feet feel numb.
He has the knife tucked securely in his palm, and he feels that sense of deja vu wash over him again, reaching out to unbolt the door.
He doesn’t know what awaits him.
Hoseok pushes the door open slowly, and it’s almost as if he feels the blood rush out of his face- he knows that he must be deathly pale, right now.
There is a stag lying at the foot of the first rickety, wooden step.
The animal is laid on his side. Its dead eyes stare up at the sky, unfeeling, and Hoseok processes the way its blood is beginning to pool and congeal around its body.
It looks like it has been gutted thoroughly by skilled hands.
Hoseok is sure that if he was to reach out and touch the carcass, it would still be warm. This kill is so fresh, Hoseok can hardly believe it’s even dead.
It’s a gorgeous animal- his rack is full and almost perfectly symmetrical on both sides.
This is so obviously a gift.
A gift, left specifically for hoseok- the omega sees the paw prints in the snow next to the massive body, he sees the drag marks in the packed snow from the tree line to the first step.
Hoseok knows that if he leaves this carcass here to rot, it will not be good for him.
A kill like this would attract much bigger threats than the alpha who left it here. The last thing Hoseok wants to deal with is a lethargic bear awoken entirely too soon from hibernation, or actual wolves- not the shifting type.
Hoseok also knows that to let this animal go to waste would be an evil thing to do. This stag could feed him until summertime, if preserved correctly. Hoseok’s fingers twitch. It would be such a waste, to let this deer rot away like that.
But to take the stag, to eat it- that would be an acceptance.
Hoseok cannot let this animal’s death be for naught. Hoseok was taught that killing just to kill was not a just thing to do- he was taught that animals as big as this deer were just as worthy of a long life as he was. To kill an animal like this without eating it- that was just wrong. Beyond evil. To take life so carelessly was to be punished.
This was a gift. Hoseok knows that this is a gift , and he has every right to reject it, but this is not as easy a decision to make as it had been with the squirrels.
It’s almost as if this alpha- unknown as they were- had hit Hoseok right in the nerve, right where it would hurt the most. It was such a flashy way to court someone. In the city, gifts like these are unheard of. Most alphas are unwilling to kill an animal as big as this stag and offer it in full to an omega like him- like Hoseok .
The omega’s fear ebbs away into something like pity for the poor deer, the sheer force of it blindsiding him for a second. He finds himself inching out of the doorway, freezing cold and barefoot. The knife goes slack in his hand. He crouches down near the steps and lets his eyes track over the fallen animal. He can’t smell any type of sweetness- he cannot smell anything that would indicate that this animal had been tampered with beyond the initial cleaning. Hoseok has a very good nose.
What a shame it would be, for this beautiful animal to die for nothing.
The omega knows how it will look if he claims this animal for himself. He knows it will not be in his favor to accept this gift, but his conscience is not allowing him to reject it.
He takes the stag by the antlers, gently. He moves its head so it lies in a way that looks natural- like it’s just resting. Hoseok touches its body, and he was right- it’s still warm, but just barely.
“Thank you," Hoseok tells the empty yard, his voice raw from general disuse. His eyes track the tree line- he follows the bloody paw prints in the snow that lead back to the forest. The alpha must be watching. Hoseok’s human eyes are inferior to any wolf’s, but he knows he is there.
He shivers- his nerves sizzle and pop under his skin. He knows he’s making a mistake, he knows it. He can’t do anything to stop it.
He clears his throat, roughly.
“Thank you. I will eat well.”
After all, it’s not like he would be able to bury this kill under the rhododendron bush alongside the squirrels.
Hoseok drags the carcass away from the front of his home, putting all of his strength into dragging the large animal by its legs. He pulls it out to the side of his home, closer to the opposite side of the tree line than before. the blood seeps into the snow that lays packed on the ground, Hoseok’s ankles sinking into it as he moves slowly.
He gets to work with skinning the animal right away, slowly stripping back its hide and cutting away all of the lean muscle that lies beneath its tough skin. Afterwards. the omega is careful not to miss a single piece of meat. The stag had been so strong- Hoseok cannot believe how much he has pulled from the carcass. He’s left streaked in blood by the end of it, but when he slices away the last of the deerskin, he feels his omega perk up in interest.
He is still very afraid, yes, but this alpha- they provided.
A stag that large… it’s something hoseok had never even allowed himself to even dream about receiving as a gift, especially when they have been approaching a winter as rough as it is. Deer this large are hard to come by- and even harder to bring down.
He’ll dispose of the stripped body later- he’ll say a prayer to whatever god is listening for the poor animal’s soul and then he’ll get to work with curing the meats. After dragging the carcass farther away from his home, He brushes his bloody hands against his trousers, long-stained coppery brown.
The salts that sit stacked in Hoseok’s quaint pantry surely will be of use to him, soon. He won’t have to worry about going hungry at all this winter.
After he strips it of its fat with a flat, blunt blade, Hoseok hangs the deerskin up in his cellar. He’s wary to leave it out in the open, even in a brutal winter as it has been. The bears have long since entered their hibernation, but Hoseok doesn't think it’s such a terrible thing to be cautious.
It’s his very first fur- hide, technically, but when he brushes his hand down the length of it, it feels velvet-soft. He could very well line a nest with something like this, perhaps when it’s finished drying up in the spring. The moment he finds himself considering it, he flushes deeply.
He can’t believe it- he cannot believe how dumb he has allowed himself to be. Regardless, his stomach will be full, and that is enough to be thankful for.
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After weeks of terror, Hoseok finally finds himself relaxed as a piece of venison sizzles away in the aged cast-iron pan on the stove.