Sterek Secret Valentine 2016

Now the young prince had nothing against romance. In fact, spending every day with his trusted guards Boyd and Reyes was reason enough to hold firm belief in the existence of true love. There was even a time when he’d thought that such a bond was something that he himself might be able to have. He’d been wrong and now standing in the heavily decorated glittering ballroom, he regretted attending the damn thing. Spending the night dodging attempt after attempt of courtship was making him surly. Love should never be this artificial, this strategized manoeuvring of bodies and interests to snare a human heart.

He snatched a flute of champagne from a passing server and peered over the rim at the fools on the dance floor swirling and smiling, grateful that where he stood almost hidden against the billowing drapes shielded him from offers to join in. As the music ended, the crowd parted and movement caught his eye - a head thrown back in laughter in a manner most familiar to him.  Derek stepped sideways to get a better view and that’s when he saw him.

Stiles Stilinski, the son of his mother’s Chief of Guards.

The childhood sweetheart who stole his heart and then broke it.

His heart clenched painfully in his chest. His vision blurred and head felt light and giddy.

Derek stumbled backward, grateful for the curtain covered wall and the support it lent. He could barely breathe, far less stand on his own. Reaching back he gripped the cloth to ground himself. It had been exactly one year since he’d last seen Stiles. Twelve months since he’d turned down Derek’s proposal at this same damn ball and made off for parts unknown with Derek’s cousin Scott McCall. Three hundred and sixty five fucking days since Derek had last been happy and whole. And now here he stood, drinking champagne and dressed to the nines, laughing with Scott’s mother, Lady Melissa as if he hadn’t shredded Derek the last time he was here.

When had he come back?

Why had he come back?

And why had no one told him?

Just then Stiles looked across the room and their eyes met.  Their gazes held and with a wry sad smile on his face, Stiles raised his glass to Derek before swallowing down the champagne in one go. Derek felt his stomach turn as shock gave way to anger.

Who did he think he was? Derek steamed.  How dare he come back thinking he could toast Derek?

Without taking his eyes off Derek, Stiles said something to Lady Melissa causing her to look his way.

A peal of bells chimed inside his head like alarms warning of an impending attack.

As Stiles turned to bow to Melissa, signalling the end of their conversation, Derek panicked, turning on his heels and striding out of the ballroom, and out onto the back patio that opened out on the Palace grounds also known as the Preserve.  The February air was sharp on his skin but Derek didn’t stop walking when he hit the edge of the patio. He didn’t stop when he hit the edge of the lawn and crossed over into the woods.  

He had to put enough distance between him and Stiles before he did something stupid. He did not know why Stiles left him or why Stiles was back, but he knew that he had to escape before he did something he regretted.  So he kept walking.

When he did stop, he scoffed at himself. In his haste to flee the presence of Stiles, he’d ended up outside the secret garden where most of his memories with Stiles had happened.

This garden had belonged to an ancestor seeking a hideaway in the woods, but the wall had long been overgrown with vines and shrubs, and the gated entranced was sealed shut with a massive rusted lock. He, Scott and Stiles had been playing hide and seek when he was eleven and the boys were nine. Scott had been ‘it’ and he and Stiles had stumbled upon the garden.  Neither boy had ever told Scott about the hidden entrance Stiles had discovered beneath the vines; and over the next fifteen years, it had belonged to just the two of them. It had been a secret fort at the beginning, host many an epic play battle between the boys. It was a refuge when Stiles’ mother had died when he was thirteen, and the young boys had taken to gardening as a way to counter the loss of life, instilling new life where there was none. It was where as mid-teens, they practiced kissing so they wouldn’t embarrass themselves with the girls they were interested in. It was also where they came to the realization that they weren’t interested in any girls – why would they be when they had each other.

Derek sat on the stone bench in the middle of the garden where they’d given their virginities to each other and looked ahead into the darkness.  He couldn’t help but think it mirrored his darkening emotions.  Elbows on his knees, the prince buried his face in his palms and did what he’d done every day for the last three hundred and sixty five – he mourned.

Moments later, he was unsurprised to feel someone sit down next to him, a thin layer of warmth on his left.  A traitorous voice in his head whispered ‘You wanted him to follow you…’

Derek couldn’t disagree. It was why he was here in their secret place. He had so many questions, he realized; questions that could never have been answered in the ballroom.  So his subconscious had led him here, knowing Stiles would find him. But as composed as he felt,  his tongue knotted into itself and prevented him from both asking for answers and railing against his faithless lover.

He gave his face a quick scrub with his palms and straightened up, turning his head to look at Stiles.  He was as beautiful as Derek remembered.  

Stiles reached over and touched his arm.  Derek flinched.

“Don’t touch me” he bit out.

Stiles held his hands up, signalling peace, his expression full of repentance. He opened his mouth as if to say something but no sound came out.

He rolled his eyes and looked away from his ex, fingers gripping the seat of the bench hard to keep from punching him.

"Why?"

The single word slipped out before he could stop himself. The prince wasn't even sure what he was asking. Why did you leave? Why did you let me love you only to shatter me into a thousand jagged pieces? Why didn't you want to marry me? Why were you able to throw away years of being together like that? Why didn't you love me back?

Or maybe just Why wasn't I worth it to you?

Goodness, for a young Royal he was pathetic. But he'd never been a prince with Stiles. He'd just been Derek of 'Derek and Stiles'. But he wasn't even that anymore - there was no 'Derek and Stiles'. There hadn't been for a long time.

He took a long deep breath and mentally switched into the role he'd been training for his whole life. The widening of Stiles' eyes told him that Stiles knew exactly when Derek became Prince Derek of the Royal House of Hale.

"So, you're back," he said, voice cool and detached but yet still unable to keep out an undertone of bitterness. Stiles had never even said goodbye. He'd just said he couldn't marry him and that he was sorry . And then he'd left.

"Yes," he said quietly. "I'm back."

The way his eyes bore into his, his gaze almost penetrating, made Derek look away.  Stiles seemed to be searching for something in Derek but he couldn't imagine what.

"And is your reason for your return as compelling as the reason for your departure?"

The question was infused with every ounce of royal condescension that Derek could muster.

"Yes." was the simple response.

The silence hung between them for a moment before Stiles ventured cautiously, "Did you miss me?"

Derek launched from his seat and paced a few steps away.

Miss him? Derek had thought that death would have been less painful. There were days he couldn't find the strength to get out of bed. He'd gone without bathing, without eating and though he waited well into the late night hours when everyone else in the palace had gone to sleep, Derek had cried until no tears would come and the feel of his eyelids grated harshly on his eyes. Miss him? Stiles had been the sun shining light on his world.  And then his world was darkness.  

"Why are you here Stiles?" he asked instead of answering. "Tonight of all nights. On the anniversary of your rejection? "

"I never rejected you" the younger man hurried out. "I never....rejected...you."

Derek spun to look at him. Stiles was now standing next to the bench.

"You didn't?" Derek spit the words out at Stiles, all princely composure gone. "Oh I'm sorry. Perhaps I misunderstood? Help me remember it correctly. I asked you, on this Valentines night, one year ago, to marry me and share my life with me. Is that right?"

"Yes."  Stiles' voice was small but the response clear.

"Yes, indeed," Derek continued. "Your answer  - because this is where it gets confusing - was what again?"

"No."

It hurt as much to hear it now as it did twelve months ago.  Deflated, Derek turned away again, unable to look at Stiles.

"See that's what I remembered. Our definitions of the word rejection differ vastly young Stilinski."

Stiles marched up to him. "I wish I could explain my answer Derek. I really do but I can't just yet..."

"Why not?" came the demand. "Do you know what you did to me Stiles? When you turned me down and walked away, did you ever think about what damage you were leaving in your wake? Or were your days and nights so filled with my cousin that the remnants of me never once crossed your mind?"

"Fuck Derek!" Stiles dragged a hand through his hair in an angry frustrated gesture. "How can you stand there and think that?  I have never loved anyone else and I have never been with anyone else and if you'd just look me in the eye, you would know that I'm telling you the truth.  Days and nights? Try seconds and breaths, because not a single one of either has passed without an awareness of you and how you must hate me now."

Rolling his neck, Stiles stepped back.

"News travels fast Derek. I heard about the visiting families looking to make a match with the esteemed Prince Derek. Every noble family within travelling distance was looking to make an alliance because your mother put the word out that you were eligible and available.  Every day I searched the news for word of you, thinking that day would be the day I find out that you'd given in and accepted someone's proposal."

Derek scoffed. "I wish I had said yes then. So you could know the loss of me. So you could see that someone wanted - valued - what you didn't"

"Don't be an asshole Derek." The words were soft. "I most certainly knew the loss of you. Is there...is there any chance that you still love me Der?"

His entire body seized in fear and anger. What the hell was Stiles playing at.

"Fuck you!" Derek began to walk away but Stiles grabbed his hand.

"Please Derek," he pleaded. "I know I've hurt you but if I haven't completely wrecked things, if there is the smallest shred of love left in your heart for me, please..."

"Tell me why you turned down my proposal," came the counter.

Stiles looked like he wanted to scream. "I can't."

"You can't?" Derek frowned, not understanding. "Or you won't?"

Hands clenched tight in fists at his side, Stiles bit out "Both. Not yet. Not until you answer me of your love."

He was confused and weary but most importantly he was done - done with whatever games Stiles thought to play with him; done with this torture of the heart.

"I find that I cannot remember a time when I didn't love you." He said to some imaginary person just beyond Stiles' shoulder because he refused to look at him. "I find that I simply do not know how to not love you. Like I said a year ago, my love for you is as the air in my lungs and the blood in my veins - constant and necessary for life. Since I seem to be physically alive, yes Stiles, some measure of love for you lives yet."

Stiles broke into an enormous grin.

"Oh thank God!" he proclaimed in relief. "I love you so much Derek. Now I can explain to you the events of last Valentines feast."

"No."

"What?" Stiles was lost.

"Save your explanations and your declarations Stiles." Prince Derek was back, voice cold and unfeeling. "I don't care. You had your say, I had mine. We're done here."

"Leave." the Prince commanded. "Leave the palace, leave the kingdom. Just leave and never return. I will be accepting the next proposal that comes my way. You and I are done."

Stiles grabbed his shirt and begged. "No. Derek...please don't say that just give me a chance. You just said that you loved me still.  Please Derek, not when we've sacrificed so much. Please I love you."

Derek couldn't bear it any longer. He pushed Stiles away from him and fled the garden leaving his lover behind. As he came through the vines covering the hidden entrance on the outside, he was stopped in his tracks by his mother's voice.

"Ah, so that's where the second entrance lies," the queen commented. "I've wondered for many years now."

"Mother! What are you doing here?"

The Queen gestured to the garden. "Will you take me inside Derek? I promised my father that I'd never reopen his mother's private place but I have happy memories of being inside with my grandmother as a little one. It's been so long."

He hesitated but then nodded and guided her though the vines.

They found Stiles sitting silent on the bench, face in his hands and shoulders shaking. He raised a tear stained face to look at them.

"Master Stilinski," the queen addressed.

He jumped to his feet and bowed. "Queen Talia."

She walked over to the bench and sat down, patting the seat next to her, inviting him to sit back down. He did, glancing over to Derek who was still standing a few feet away.

"Has my son professed his love for you without explanation or insight into your departure, young man?"

Stiles nodded, his saddened gaze still on Derek.

"Then you've completed your end of the bargain." She patted his thigh. "Now I must complete mine. I will begin preparations for the wedding immediately."

Whatever Stiles was about say in response was pre-empted by Derek's "What bargain? What are you talking about Mother?"

Queen Talia smiled and signalled for Derek to sit on the other side of her.  He looked like he wanted to fuss but he complied. She held and hand from each young man in hers, lacing her fingers with theirs.

"Derek, when you  took your great uncle's wedding bands from the vault, your choice did not escape my notice. He had been the last Hale to marry into a same sex union. I knew immediately that you were planning on proposing to Stiles. While I love Stiles dearly and have no problems with your relationship, I was concerned that neither of you had experienced anything without the other. You'd never known choice because you could never see past the other."

"Now, you're a little predictable dear," she squeezed Derek's hand a little. "So I knew you'd ask him at the ball. I approached Stiles and made a deal. I told him I was not certain of your untested love and if it was as real as he seemed to think it was, then it could survive a trial or two. I led Stiles to believe that I would disown you if you continued your relationship with him; but if you could love him one year after losing all contact with him without explanation or understanding, then I would bless your union and see to the wedding myself. Stiles called me cruel and begged me to let him explain to you but I forbade it. The poor fellow had no idea you were going to propose. After he left you that night, he found me and forgot that I am his Queen. He saw me only as the instrument of your pain. He said things. I banished him for the year but sent Scott as his guard. He has been true to his love for you. You have been true to your love for him. I am happy for you both."

She released their hands and stood up. Turning to face them she reached into a pocket pulling out the rings Derek had selected. Talia placed then in Derek's palm, curling his fingers over them. She kissed both men on their foreheads before looking around at the garden.

"This s a happy place," she mused. "And perfect for a wedding."

As she walked away Derek turned to Stiles, his mother words still ringing loud in his head. Stiles loved him and had been true to him. He'd never wanted to leave Derek.

He grinned. "Marry me?"

Against all odds though, Stiles and Derek still worked well together, balancing each other out when Derek was too silent and Stiles talked to much. He had been hesitant in the beginning because he was inexperienced regarding relationships and everything he did or said felt awkward to himself, making him think Derek was going to run for the hills any second now. Over the last few weeks though, Stiles had discovered that luckily, despite his looks and following of admirers among the Hogwarts students, deep down Derek was plenty awkward as well and it all boiled down to them being two giant dorks who liked each other despite or maybe even because of everything.

It hadn’t been too long ago though that Stiles thought Derek hated his guts. Stiles would hang around the Gryffindor common room quite a lot because Scott was there and while Stiles was proud to be a Slytherin and felt comfortable with his house, he couldn’t get why he shouldn’t be allowed to spend time with his best friend at said best friend’s dorm or common room. So if he wanted to see Scott and Gryffindor Tower was where he could find him, Stiles didn’t mind at all. But he thought Derek did. He had always been rather cold towards Stiles, dismissive at the least and, glaring at him from his spot over at the common room table, he was obviously planning Stiles’ untimely death, getting so worked up on his anger that his cheeks flushed when caught Stiles glancing over.

Or so Stiles had thought, and it had hurt because as a matter of fact he really liked Derek. The guy was way smarter than he let on for some reason and regularly made Stiles’ heart flutter and insides melt when he witnessed him helping out first graders with their homework or other kids on the Quidditch field. Wednesday two weeks ago though, Stiles had had it with Derek’s antics after he caught him sneering at a silly story Stiles had been telling Scott and Allison, and he couldn’t take it anymore. Marching over to Derek, he confronted him.

“Jeez, Derek. What is your problem with me? Is it because I’m an evil Slytherin tainting your precious Gryffindor Tower? Did I mutter to myself too loudly again in the library yesterday? Because you could’ve just found yourself a different table to sit at easily enough. It’s not like I forced you there or something. So really, please explain your problem, Derek, so maybe I can avoid annoying you so damn much in the future you have to roll your eyes at everything I ever say.”

Derek looked paralyzed for a moment, before the expression on his face went from carefully blank to hurt and then angry in about three seconds. Slamming his book on the table he stood up to look Stiles in the eye when he answered.

“Maybe I just don’t know how to behave around you, alright?”

Stiles just blinked. “What is that supposed to even mean?”

“Well, maybe I just like you.”

Stiles was stunned into silence by Derek’s words, because that couldn’t be the truth at all. Taking a mental step back he briefly considered just leaving before the buzz of irritation flared up inside of him again. Derek seemed to simply bring it out in him.

“Well, maybe you should stop with your weirdo version of pigtail pulling then, grow a pair instead and ask me on a date.”

“Maybe I will.”

“Fine.”

“Fine!”

Derek stared at him for little bit longer than necessary, but no more words came out of his mouth. He rather huffed and turned around, stomping off in the direction of the dorms.

“Huh. Glad we cleared that up,” Scott stated from the other side of the room, waggling his eyebrows at Stiles.

Stiles couldn’t believe it. He threw himself on the couch next to his best friend, groaning loudly. “What the hell even happened back there, Scotty?”

“How the hell should I know, dude. I always told you Derek liked you though. You just chose not to believe me.”

“Not helping, Scott.”

Scott raised his hands in defeat at the scowl Stiles shot his way, “Just saying, man.” He looked way too smug for Stiles’ liking.

*

And that had been their beginning. In retrospect Stiles found it pretty telling they confessed their feelings of affection and attraction by yelling at each other. The memory still made him smile several times a day.

So today was Valentine’s Day at Hogwarts, Stiles was in his fifth year and for the first time he had a date. He knew Derek had planned something for them, but Stiles was at a complete loss as to what it might be. They hadn’t really been dating in the classical sense before, hadn’t kissed or even held hands yet, but taking it slow instead. So they sat together in the library doing their homework in companionable silence or took long walks along the Hogwarts grounds, simply enjoying each other’s company.

This afternoon was their first real date though and Stiles hoped for some real development. Derek had sent him a letter at breakfast, telling Stiles to meet him outside the castle after classes, so they could start the rest of the day together. Stiles had been relieved that, whatever Derek’s idea for a first date might turn out to be, they obviously would walk there together. Stiles knew that Derek was into him and was sure above anything else that he would never be mean to Stiles on purpose, still, deep down he had been a little afraid of, say, meeting him at Madam Puddifoot’s only to discover Derek had decided he didn’t like Stiles enough to be worth the hassle and rather not show up to begin with.

His insecurities flew right out the window thought when he saw Derek walking towards him, a shy smile playing around his lips but eyes bright with excitement when he came to a stop in front of Stiles.

“Ready, Stiles?” he asked and reached for his hand as Stiles started nodding enthusiastically.

“Very ready,” Stiles replied, squeezing Derek’s hand softly, marveling at the slight blush that started creeping over Derek’s cheeks when he squeezed back. Maybe Derek really had been rather flustered all those times before, when Stiles thought he had been angry about Stiles’ presence. Huh. Who would’ve thought.

After they had been walking in silence for a few minutes, the path they were taking clearly leading down to the village of Hogsmeade, Stiles couldn’t contain his curiosity anymore.

“So, where are you taking me? Are we going to Madam Puddifoot’s, drink hot chocolate and get shot at by chubby little cupids like all the cool kids do?” He knew his eyebrow waggling was over the top, but sometimes he couldn’t help it. Derek would just have to learn how to deal.

Derek stopped dead in his tracks, turning to face Stiles with a frown, visibly paling a little and his mouth dropping open to show what Stiles secretly considered the cutest bunny teeth ever.

“What? No, I…Would you want that?” Derek seemed so disappointed and out of his depth at that moment, it made Stiles feel like he kicked a bunny. “I didn’t think you’d ever want that.” Derek’s voice sounded small and Stiles grabbed his Gryffindor scarf, curling his hand into it and against Derek’s chest.

“No,” he shouted. “No, Derek. I absolutely do not want that. I was just curious and I know it’s what everyone else does, so I assumed. I…,” he hesitated, “I’ve never been on a Valentine’s date before, you know. Actually, I’ve never been on a date period. I was just babbling and I’m sure I’m going to love whatever you planned.”

The sincerity he spoke with luckily seemed to register with Derek because he looked relieved and, in the sweetest gesture Stiles’ had ever experienced, leaned down and pressed a quick kiss to Stiles cheek. Stiles could feel his face flaming up at the sappiness it displayed, but he wasn’t able to suppress the grin he felt spreading over his features.

Derek cleared his throat awkwardly, before grabbing Stiles’ hand again, pulling him further down the road. “Come on, we’re almost there.”

*

“The Shrieking Shack? Are you kidding me?” Stiles could barely hide his excitement as they stood in front of the abandoned house, staring up the ragged looking building. “I always wanted to go here, this is so cool, Derek.” He was already vibrating with impatience, pulling Derek towards the front door.

“I know, Scott told me.”

“You asked Scott?”

“Yeah, well I… I wanted to make sure to do something you’d enjoy so you wouldn’t get bored, when it’s just me who’s around.”

Stiles’ heart melted a little. “I’d never get bored with you Derek, you know that.” He threw Derek a quick, reassuring smile before turning to face the Shrieking Shack again.

“Can we go in though? I thought it wasn’t allowed?”

“It’s usually not, but -“ Derek rummaged around under his coat, pulling out a piece of metal that glinted in the late afternoon sun, “I have a key.”

He knew he was staring unintelligently, but Stiles basically felt his jaw hitting the floor when it dropped. “You have a key. To the Shrieking Shack.”

“Yeah, actually. It’s been in the family for a while now.”

Something clicked in Stiles’ head as he made the connection. “Ooooh, werewolf. Right.”

Derek nodded. “Come one, I’ll tell you inside.”

It was eerily quiet inside the house, most of the boarded up windows only letting in sunlight through small cracks, layers of dust covering the floor and furniture so thick they swallowed even the sound of their steps.

“Whoa,” Stiles gasped quietly, “this is even better than I imagined.” He took a look around before he carefully walked over to the staircase leading up to the second story of the house, minding the loose floorboards and sidestepping other junk that laid scattered around.

“Look at these scratch marks, Derek.” The ridges in the wall felt deep and uneven under the tips of Stiles’ fingers.

“Those were allegedly made by Remus Lupin, you know, the famous werewolf from the Harry Potter Hogwarts days.” Stiles jumped a little when Derek’s voice came from right next to him all of a sudden. He hadn’t heard him walk over at all.

“Yeah, I know the stories, of course. But if he went feral and had to stay here during the full moons, how come you or other werewolves don’t have to be locked away? I always wondered about that.”

Derek nodded. “It’s not a very commonly known thing, and since the stories about Harry Potter and therefore Remus Lupin are widely popular, the rest of werewolf mythology doesn’t get much exposure, if at all.”

“Is it safe to climb up the stairs? You can tell me about it while we explore.”

Derek smiled shyly at Stiles’ words, evidently pleased with Stiles’ interest in the topic. “Yeah, it’s safe,” he replied as he started ascending the stairs, beckoning Stiles to follow him.

“The main point is that there are both born werewolves as well as bitten ones. With the bitten wolves, like Remus Lupin was, it’s like a disease. The human body cannot contain the shift and people go mad with aggression and pain. That’s where all the scratches on the walls, ripped curtains and broken furniture in here come from. It’s one of the biggest crimes in werewolf society to bite a human. It’s just… it’s not right.”

“I can see that. It must’ve been horrible for them, too.” Stiles mused.

“Yes, but at least he couldn’t hurt anyone else in here. My family on the other hand, we are born werewolves. We learn control early on as kids, and when we shift – which we actually don’t until we’re about twelve, thirteen years old – we look like ordinary wolves, albeit a little bigger.”

Stiles had let his hands wander over the sofa they had walked towards, stirring up years old dust and loose shreds of what must’ve been a pillowcase once, while listening intently. His head snapped up at Derek’s words about shifting.

“Could you shift right now?”

Derek let out a small chuckle, clearly amused. “Nah, only when it’s the full moon.”

Stiles felt a tiny little surge of disappointment at that, but nodded in acknowledgment. “Ah, makes sense.”

When he looked back up at Derek he saw a glint of mischief in those hazel-green eyes and smirk tugging at the corner of Derek’s lip.

“I can howl though,” Derek stated, taking Stiles’ hand to drag him over to one of the windows. “Ready?” he asked, but didn’t wait for an actual answer before tipping his head back and letting out a, Stiles couldn’t describe it as anything else, a wolf’s howl.

“That. Was. Awesome.” Stiles shouted, almost punching Derek in the face with his flailing hands.

“Yeah, yeah,“ Derek brushed it aside, but Stiles could see the pleased smile giving Derek’s face such a soft look, he simply had to kiss Derek. It was gentle and short, yet lasted a little longer than the previous one, which had really been only a peck on the cheek than a real kiss.

“Thank you for showing me, Derek. This was an amazing first date.”

Derek ducked his head, scratching the back of his neck. “Uhm. In fact I had planned something else, too? We don’t have to if you don’t want to, but I thought we could go to “The Mended Cauldron” and just have a butterbeer or something and talk? I hear their hot chocolate is very good.”

“Of course I want to go. Come on wolf-boy, show me the way.”

The rest of their afternoon together went by quicker than Stiles thought, with them sharing childhood stories about growing up as a muggle and a werewolf, chatting about their favorite Quidditch players and what they might end up doing professionally in the future. It was nice and simple, not an awkward second between them and there were butterflies in Stiles’ stomach whenever Derek grazed his thumb over the palm of Stiles’ hand absently while talking. Because yes, they had held hands the whole time and it had been the best thing ever.

*

When they eventually left the cozy corner at “The Mended Cauldron” to make their way back to the Hogwarts, dusk was already starting to set and they had to hurry as to not miss the opening of the common Valentine’s Dinner at the Great Hall. It was right before they entered to go and join their friends at the tables, when Derek stopped Stiles.

“So, did you have a good time today, Stiles?”

“Yes, Derek, the best to be honest. There’s only one thing missing really.”

Derek tilted his head in confusion, his nose scrunching up adorably as he obviously pondered what Stiles could be meaning. He shrugged helplessly, throwing Derek a sheepish smile and mumbling “A real kiss, maybe?”

Derek huffed a laugh at that and stepped closer to Stiles, right into his personal space. Wrapping his arms around Stiles’ waist he pulled him flush against his body, his gaze flicking down to Stiles’ lips before he leaned in and closed the distance between them.

As far as first real kisses go, Stiles couldn’t imagine anything better than the one they shared then and the many more that’d follow.

“He could make things puff with his hands!” Derek was later lead to know, for the hundredth something time.

It didn’t matter. He wasn’t counting. He loved that his little girl was able to share everything she wanted with him and he was always going to make the most of what she wanted to give him.

They carried on talking about Mr. Stiles’ magic until it was time to have her bath. She mimicked the lights Mr. Stiles could make appear on his hands with the bubbles Derek made for her.

The next week was: “He healed Akanksha’s cut!” and the next was “He made the apple I gave him fly!” followed by “He wrote on the board with no hands! No hands, Daddy!” and so on so forth until Mr. Stiles was starting to sound like a mix of Derek’s favorite superheroes. Deadpool with a heavy hint of Miss Marvel.

Derek learns about Stiles just as much as he does about putting out a fire, or sitting long sleepless nights dreaming of fires past.

Stiles is a magician with a specialty in healing who pays often visits to Beacon Hills Elementary to teach kids first-aid.

And apparently, Derek later is told by his friend Isaac, other colorful skills they definitely won’t need. No one understands why the kids of BHE have grown the habit of pick pocketing candy from under the clueless noses of the adults to share with each other. Well, no one but, teacher Scott, who’s got a pretty good idea but thinks no harm no foul, and hey, the kids are learning to share!

Isaac and Scott (who’s a nice guy to be around of and surprisingly one of the few that can make Isaac blush visibly) get a kick out of it during one of their rare nights together, when Derek manages to get a sitter. Still, Mr. Stiles is nothing but a shared knowledge between them, as Derek’s not sure he’s ever seen him, but he’s starting to grow on Derek.

Just like a weed.

He doesn’t question it much.

∞゜∞・。∞。・゜∞゜・∞゜∞・。∞。・゜∞゜・∞゜∞・。∞。・゜∞゜・∞゜∞・。∞。・゜∞゜・∞゜∞・。∞

Being a fireman wasn’t easy.

Sure, nowadays they had more commodities. With magic making its way out to the public eye due to recent events, more and more jobs got a helping hand that didn’t necessarily took them out of business.

For Derek’s work, it meant Sprinklers (a word he still didn’t feel comfortable using, since it had been born as a derogatory term only to later be claimed back by the ones who had suffered through it. Derek hadn’t been one of them, since he had always been just a werewolf. No magic anywhere in his bones but the way they shifted to accommodate his wolf form), though he prefers the term Fluid Mages.

That’s what he finds when he arrives at the scene of his first fire for the day: a ready team of Fluid Mages, already in their complete red/orange uniforms. A couple of gray-clad others stand more to the right: mages meant to stand ready in case there are reports of a gas leak.

As soon as they turn on the hoses Derek feels in control. The mages get to work and with their directions, guide the water to every dangerous nook and cranny of the house. Suddenly the hoses stop.

“There’s someone inside.” A woman next to Derek says.

She’s wearing a hijab, slashed across with seven carefully painted yellow lines. Seven yellow lines. She’s a Seer.

Derek hears his boss call out to him even before he notices he’s moving. Danny’s going to chew his head off for this, but he doesn’t let that stop him.

He uses his nose as best as he can, though everything charred around him seems to smell the same, and it’s when he’s cursing the fact that he hadn’t even thought to bring his helmet (this is no unlike him, it’s unnerving) that he notices the faint blue light coming from a room. It’s not a lamp, it’s something else, something more. Derek ignores the fire around him and runs.

There’s a man crouched over a body. They’re both dressed like civilians, so Derek approaches them immediately. He leaps over a wooden plank that’s fallen off, smoke and fire and the smell of everything begging him to lose his orientation. But he won’t. He’s here and saving these people.

It’s not until he grabs the shoulder of the guy who’s crouching that the man seems to realize he’s there. His eyes glow a strong purple. Derek looks down to see his hands are covered in blue smoke, the source of the light, and that the person who’s on the floor (little girl not much older than his daughter), lying in a fetal position is expelling dark smoke from her mouth. This man’s a mage.

“She’s inhaled a lot!” The man screams at the same time Derek does “Outside!”

The man shakes his head and Derek feels his nostrils flare. Right next to them a loud crack sounds. Derek instinctively shields the two people with his body but it’s only the side-kitchen (or what Derek thinks might be a kitchen) falling apart. They don’t have much time, and he’s not patient enough anyways. He needs to get them out of here.

There’s a tug on his hair and the man raises himself enough to scream in his ear. He talks so fast Derek doesn’t even have time to tell him he can hear him just fine.

“I couldn’t pull it off!” He says and Derek’s confused for a second before he follows the man’s finger. He’s pointed at a beam which is currently pressing the girl’s entire leg to the floor. “Either the smoke in her lungs or the beam! I can’t do both!”

Derek nods and then uses his hand to gesture between them. Together, then, it says. Let’s do this, the man’s nod responds.

Derek moves to the beam. It’s heavy work, even for a werewolf like him, with experience and adrenaline under his belt, so he doesn’t understand how a Healer Mage could possibly even think of moving it without help but he doesn’t dwell on it.

Together, they get the girl free, though she’s now the only one not coughing with effort.

When she screams thanks to the weight standing up puts on her foot, Derek and the man exchange nods and move to each side of her.

Together, they move her through the smoke and fire and the chaos.

Then, just as they’re about to cross the threshold the entire thing starts to collapse.

“Go!” The man screams, letting go, and Derek doesn’t think, just does.

He gets the girls out of the house, through the front door, down the steps where there are already two more Healers waiting. They barely glance at Derek with words of thanks before whisking her out to their ambulance.

Derek turns around, ready to bolt for the house again, when he sees the man holding the support beams above his head.

Derek stops in his tracks. The blue light from the man’s fingers has now turned to purple, to match his eyes (that even from this distance Derek can see, can practically feel, they’re so charged) and the beads of sweat and dust on his forehead are visible even without Derek using his werewolf senses.

The man makes sure he’s out of reach when he drops the dome of purple light around him and lets the house fall down.

They’re both breathing heavily now, but when the guy turns around he gives Derek a bright, genuine smile.

He passes Derek by with a simple pat on the chest before he goes in the direction of the ambulances.

By the time Derek’s legs manage to walk him long enough to where the fire trucks are, Danny’s already ordering him to go check himself out on the ambulance and leave the job to the ones who value their own lives and don’t act like reckless fools. He gives Derek a reluctant one armed hug because of course he’s pissed but it’s Danny, and with Danny you’re still always family.

When Derek reaches one of the ambulances he sees the man from before sitting on the back of it. There’s a brunette there, with short cut hair, apparently giving him a piece of his mind.

“I would not be the one to carry your charred bones to Scott’s.” She says matter-of-factly.

“It’s alright, Mason would.” Derek thinks it’s supposed to be a joke but that doesn’t save the guy from getting smacked in the head.

The woman turns around and moves towards Derek.

“You look and smell even worse than him. Get in the ambulance.”

Derek looks at the man and thinks, I doubt it, though he is looking a little better for the wear now that all the black soot has been cleaned off his body. He’s only wearing a t-shirt and jeans. He ran into a burning building in a t-shirt and jeans. Jesus. At least Derek was in his full fireman gear.

“I got him, Malia.”

“Suit yourself, what do I care? I got more gravely injured people to heal.” Malia gestures at Derek to go and walks away but the gentle manner of how she pats the man’s cheek before she’s gone betrays her harsh words.

The guy gestures at Derek to sit down on the back of the ambulance. He doesn’t move when Derek sits right next to him, only angles his body so they’re facing each other.

“You can close your eyes, if you want. Some people find it icky.”

Icky? Derek starts to say but then there’s this…Electric current going through his body as the guy’s hands roam through his face, his body, his legs, slowly without touching but Derek swears he can feel them. He doesn’t even have it in him to say anything to stop it, even though he’s a werewolf and was already starting to feel the small burns heal.

He finds himself starting into purple eyes again and he’s almost saying something, anything when they startle him even more as they turn a deep amber color.

Derek honestly can’t pick between them.

“You’re not wearing a uniform.” He says when the man pats his leg, telling him he’s done.

It might sound like something he just blurted out but mostly he was actively looking for a name tag, some initials stitched, anything that would let Derek know this man’s name.

“Technically, I’m not on duty.” The guy answers, gesturing wildly at his simple clothing, not a Mage color in sight.

Derek nods.

“Should I do you too?” Technically-not-on-duty-but-still-got-myself-into-a-burning-building asks pointing at Derek’s chest.

Derek’s breath catches. “I– What?”

“Your lungs. I already got mine done while you guys finished up.”

“Oh. No.” Derek points a finger at himself while still marvelously multitasking and wondering at his eloquence “Werewolf.”

“Really?” The guy’s eyes mark a not so subtle highway through Derek’s entire body.

Weirdly, he doesn’t mind it much. Maybe it’s all the adrenaline talking. He can’t wait to get home to his daughter, right now. He always can’t wait, but in situations like this he feels it more strongly than ever.

The guy coughs and looks away. He tries to disguise it by summoning that blue light again, and playing with it between his fingers. Some of the cuts on his hands start healing. Derek worries a bit when he thinks about he could have licked them clean first.

He takes the opportunity to rank his eyes through the man’s body but the guy must have caught him looking because he says:

“Want me to draw in the air? Sometimes I can do that, if I concentrate enough.”

“I thought you were a Healer.” Derek said back, because he couldn’t exactly tell a guy he just met how enraptured he was by his hands, and the way his fingers disappeared over, under, around the blue light that has now also turned to blue smoke only to appear again and dance around it like a parade of Fae under the moonlight.

“I am many things. As are you, Derek Hale.”

Derek looks him in the eyes sharply but the man starts laughing and has to visibly stop to catch his breath before he points to Derek’s torso.

“It’s on your uniform,” He raises his hands like an apology and Derek tries not to linger on the thoughts of how warm his face feels when he sees his nametag firmly attached to his chest. If anyone asks about it, he just came out of a burning building with two people in tow.

“I’m not a psychic, though Lydia would kill me if I dared use that designation in front of her. The proper term is Seer, if you please.” He says in a mock tone, probably imitating this Lydia person. Derek wonders if he means Ms. Lydia Martin, who’s a sort of an international icon and frankly quite scary in all sorts of manners, but he doesn’t fetch how someone could refer to her so casually. “I just like to freak people out.”

“Is jumping into burning buildings and then staying behind a part of that entire M.O.?”

The guy shrugs and his hands stop flashing.

“I don’t really– I recognized her from Scott’s class, Mr.…. Hale.” The guy squints at his name tag for a while before he gasps “Wait, Hale? As in, Erica Hale?”

Derek’s about to ask how he knows this before he dedicates it a minute to put it all together.

“You’re Mr. Stiles.”

“Ugh, I always tell them to drop the mister. Makes me feel old. But, dude, your daughter is a piece of work. And I mean that in the best, most wonderful way possible. Some of her questions should be brought to the Chancellors because that’s the answers they should be looking for in that universe-scryingthing of theirs.”

A million answers pass through Derek’s mind: thank you, I knew I was blessed from the moment her big brown eyes settled on mine; it’s called Advanced Sinus Prospect, not universe-scrying; why have your eyes stopped glowing?; and many extras, except what comes out of his mouth is:

“Have dinner with us Friday? I’m sure she’d love to delight you with more of those.”

“With your daughter?” Stiles asks, but not unpleasantly. Most likely he’s just making sure. Shouldn’t Derek be too? “I love her, man, but are you sure?”

Derek nods and tries to be less obvious about how much he wants a yes “It’s just dinner. Worst case scenario she’ll grow tired of you sooner than me.”

Stiles grin widens brightly. Derek thinks it does more wonders to his face than his purple mesmerizing eyes did.

“You’re a bit of a pessimist, huh?”

“Prove me wrong?”

And oh, Stiles so does. Through a dozen shared meals, even more dates, through making his daughter laugh and run and scream excitedly so easily, through managing to make Derek smile! Laugh out loud in a way he hadn’t in a long while, through kisses and hugs and near-death scares that drive them both crazy but have worryingly started to feel like usual procedures and lead to them all spending the night cuddling, the three of them together on Erica’s big bed.

The only one who acknowledges that Stiles even spoke is Peter, though, which basically means that no one acknowledges that Stiles has spoken. He considers raising his voice, but vampires are apparently a serious issue that have Derek and Scott politely calling each other idiots way more than the normal supernatural-crisis-of-the-week amount.

“Do you think they sparkle?” Stiles asks instead, just to be aggravating. So he’s feeling a little ignored, sue him. At least Kira laughs, even if Lydia rolls her eyes and Derek shoots him the most severely unimpressed look he’s gotten all week. Malia just blinks big doe eyes up at him from her spot on the floor between Lydia’s legs and he’s forced to remember that they weren’t nearly as far along in the pop culture catch-up as he’d like to be.

Why did everyone in this damn pack have to be so mainstream media incompetent?

“I think,” Derek bites out, addressing Stiles directly for the first time since the meeting started and he’d snarled when Stiles’ sneakers had tracked mud inside the gutted living room. “That four bodies have been found, drained of blood, and your father running interference isn’t going to last much longer if we don’t figure out how to stop the coven.” Stiles pulls his meanest expression out of his repertoire and directs it at Derek, focusing hard on keeping the thrum-thrum-thrum of his heartbeat steady.

“We could always invite them to join our pack,” Jackson mutters, not looking up from his phone in a fairly good imitation of noninterest in the subject at hand. “It’s not like we’ve ever discriminated by species before.”

Five pack members laugh at that and Stiles tries not to show how obviously insulted he is. Jackson meets his eye and smirks like he knows and Stiles flicks his tongue like a reptile because it’s below the belt, but everyone knows that if you’re somehow losing an argument with Jackson, all you have to do is bring up the Kanima disaster.

“Do you think that’s possible?” Isaac asks, curled up underneath Allison’s arm the way great danes try and sit on laps because they think they’re the size of a teacup poodle. “Convince them to feed from other sources and join up?”

Scott drags a hand through Isaac’s curls and keeps his palm steady at the base of his neck, turns his gaze to Derek who looks incredibly incensed that his pack members are seriously considering asking a coven of vampires to join them for pack family dinner.

“I dated a vampire once,” Peter says, apropos of nothing, leering a little. Stiles gags at him and Lydia looks damn near ready to draw a knife out from somewhere on her person and stab it between Uncle Creepy’s eyes. He ignores Lydia and leers even more intensely at Stiles, but backs off when Derek makes some sort of sub-vocal growl noise. “There is, of course, etiquette when it comes to going to speak to a coven.” Peter continues, smiling pleasantly. And isn’t everyone in this pack just so damn pleasant today?

*

Derek figures he should have expected that, while Peter might have known the traditional vampire etiquette rules, the old geezer wasn’t going to give up the knowledge that easy. In his defense, when Peter had started talking, Stiles had stuck the damn remote into his mouth, uncaring of things like germs and boundaries. Remotes weren’t supposed to be sexy, Derek had tried to tell himself desperately, but he was beginning to think that everything Stiles did was somehow sexy to Derek. It really was quite exhausting, and not a little embarrassing.

Jackson, still the proud beta with the best nose, had shot Derek a severely displeased look when Derek started leaking feelings all over the room like he’d done when he was a teenager. The rest of the pack hadn’t noticed, but it didn’t mean that Derek’s fluffy gushy feelings weren’t affecting their behaviors anyway—once he’d moved on from thinking about Stiles’ mouth, he’d started thinking aggressively about his eyes and his loyalty and the way he sometimes grabbed Derek’s hand when the two of them were paired up during recon missions and something went south.

And once the feelings were leaking all over the room, the rest of the pack had started snuffling closer to their own loved ones, nuzzling and scenting like they were a room of damn cats and Derek only had himself to blame.

Of course, his preoccupation with trying to reign himself in led to him being unable to pay close enough attention to Peter so he could decide how much of what his uncle said should be taken with a grain of salt.

In the beginning, when Scott and Derek had lumped themselves together and decided to try the whole fake it ‘til you make it blended pack shtick, recon missions always ended up sticking a human with either alpha, to keep power imbalances steady. Lydia, who wasn’t actually a human, and Allison, who was likely the deadliest of the lot of them, had protested wildly and if he and Scott had rescinded that unspoken rule for the pair of them, it wasn’t like they’d ever be able to force Stiles into being babysat.

He didn’t usually need it, anyway, anymore. Derek suspected he’d been training with Allison’s father and Jackson on the sly—two people who wouldn’t go easy on him simply because of his human status, and it was common knowledge that Deaton was quickly running out of things to teach their resident Spark, since he was catching onto everything faster than anyone could have anticipated. Derek had always been impressed with Stiles, but this kind of indomitable determination to carry his own weight in the group had paved the way for something deeper than bald, grudging, admiration. He’d come a long way from the floppy sixteen year old he’d been when Scott had been turned.

But someone should have really thought twice before grouping up Isaac, Liam, and Stiles for a recon mission to go and spy on a coven of vampires.

“Are we certain they didn’t just off themselves?” Jackson asks, flipping through a car magazine, like he thinks the rest of them can’t notice the tension at his shoulders. Jackson was a dick, but he’d settled easily into pack life after they’d offed the kanima part of him. Lydia gives him a look, and even Peter looks vaguely concerned in a way that isn’t creepy, and Scott had had to be stopped from going after his beta and his boyfriend and his Stiles.

Malia slinks her way over to Derek as Lydia takes control of the rescue mission planning and presses her face against his knee, curling a hand around his other calf. “He’ll be okay,” she says, intuitive and understanding in a way she’d worked hard to learn after they’d rescued her from being trapped as a fox for all of those years. Derek can tell she’s leeching away his anxiety, and he feels extremely bad for being such a complete disaster of an alpha, but Jackson had broken a mug and Allison had snapped an arrow and, it wasn’t like he was the only one freaking out, okay?

“We should tell Mason,” Kira says plaintively. “You know how he and Liam are—he’d want to know.”

“He’ll want to help,” Derek says, before anyone else can respond. “And he’ll do no one any good if he gets hurt.”

Stiles had been pushing to formally ask Mason to join their pack for months now, biting out a fairly bitter it’s near impossible for a human to know that had made Derek feel like crap. No one had asked Stiles to formally join, and Derek figures it’s mostly assumed he knows his place. But, well, what if he doesn’t?

“The coven likely took them to send a message,” Peter says, looking entirely too relaxed. “A mate from each alpha and the pack pup.”

“So we ditch the pack dinner and go straight to the stakes and fire,” Allison snaps, and everyone is basically ignoring how hot Derek’s face is getting—it’s not like he’d been under any illusions that he and Stiles would manage to keep whatever it was they’d been doing a secret. Not in a normal pack, and definitely not in his unhealthily codependent harem of nosy teenaged idiots. But, well.

Just because they’d known doesn’t mean they’d ever said anything. Derek’s not obtuse enough to believe they wouldn’t have brought it up the moment they figured it out if they’d had some sort of problem with he and Stiles messing around, since they’d called a formal meeting the second they caught wind that Liam had started sniffing after Hayden again.

Lydia rallies the troops, Jackson gets Danny to bring over blue prints of the conveniently abandoned bowling alley off of Main Street, Allison carves stakes, her eyes spitting fire. Derek tries not to think about the fact that Stiles is human and infuriating, being held up by a coven of vampires.

*

Stiles kicks at Isaac, pinches at the skin on Liam’s palm so that his claws extend and Stiles can use them to rip through his zip-tie bond. His head is throbbing and his vision is shaky at best, but it’s unlikely the vampires would have thought it necessary to drug him—he was just a human, after all, and it wasn’t like pack members left one another behind. He kicks at Isaac again, wonders how much wolfsbane the curly-haired brat had to have been given to keep him knocked out this solidly for this amount of time. They’d recently impressed a neighboring pack with their abnormally high wolfsbane tolerance, gleaned from years of being poisoned with it by everyone and his wife.

Mostly the wives, Stiles thinks to himself wryly. He barks out a laugh and instantly feels bad about it, since Victoria Argent was dead and it’d taken Allison a long time to accept that her mother genuinely hated werewolves that much. Stiles privately thinks taking a second werewolf boyfriend had helped her along the way, but he knows that’s insensitive and Allison could easily take him in a fight, so he tries to avoid saying it out loud.

Liam groans a little, pained and drowsy, and Stiles cups a hand at the back of his neck, wishing, not for the first time, that he could leech away pain like the wolves. Liam was a piece of work, had followed his beta-cousins’ lead in becoming a monumental tool when he’d first been turned, but he was also sixteen and more of a puppy than Scott. Even Peter tended to avoid making Liam cry.

“C’mon, Liam,” Stiles mutters under his breath, pinching at his palms again, trying to jumpstart a bit of the shift so that his enhanced wolfiness can work the rest of the wolfsbane out of his system. The younger boy smacks his lips together and blinks bleary wolf-gold eyes up at Stiles, looking confused and frightened.

“We’ve just got to get Isaac up,” Stiles tells him quietly, “And then we’ll figure out what to do.”

Liam’s not much use until Stiles scents him enough that he can mostly ignore the overwhelming stench of blood and sickly-sweet death that permeates the air so thoroughly even Stiles can smell it. He waits patiently while Stiles works through the wolfsbane-drenched ropes, eyes watering at the pain but teeth implanted firmly in his lower lip so that he doesn’t cry, and then he scoots over to Isaac to scratch a few cuts into the taller boy’s arms so that he can bleed out some of the wolfsbane. Liam doesn’t hesitate to leech the pain out, looking guilty for causing Isaac any level of pain, even for his own good, and Stiles leaves them to it, clamoring to his feet, determined not to upchuck, and starts inspecting the cell they’re in.

When Isaac finally grunts and rolls over, snuffling against Liam for a second before letting out a long-winded groan of exhaustion, Stiles looks over at the pair of them.

“I think we should do Secret Santa this year,” Liam says shyly and Stiles marvels the idea that he might actually be the one in charge this time ‘round.

“That sounds like fun, Liam,” he says, with what he assumes is the appropriate amount of enthusiasm. “Will you come over here and see if you can bend this gate while I work on untying Isaac?”

Liam can, in fact, manipulate the bars enough that the three of them can squeeze through into the darkened hallway. There is no one around in any of the empty rooms that look to have once been offices of some sort, and the light is flickering at the end of the hall, because why wouldn’t it be, truly?

Stiles is almost beginning to psych himself up for an easy and painless escape when they slip through the door and find themselves in the old bowling alley birthday party hall. There are three bodies sprawled about the room, one on the long table, rumpling the dusty, faded birthday table cloth, and two slumped on the floor.

There are also two vampires, their Mick Jagger tape gone ignored now that they’re faced with three concussed teenage adversaries.

“So, it was nice meeting you guys—” Stiles starts, because someone has to man up and say something, but he doesn’t even get a chance to finish his fantastic sarcastic comment before there’s a vampire lunging at him.

Liam intercepts and the two of them go rolling, each grappling for the upperhand, Liam’s shift phasing in and out. Isaac goes on the offense immediately, stalking towards the second vampire, his face already shifting, and Stiles looks around for something he can use as a weapon.

He’s not sure if wooden stakes are as deadly as they seem to be in the movies, but he can’t imagine it’s pleasant in any capacity to get stabbed in the chest by a giant splinter. He gets his opportunity after the vampire growls and bites into Liam’s shoulder before throwing him across the room into the seriously outdated stereo set. Everyone is distracted by an enormous explosion noise, but Stiles is an old pro by now, knows to fight the instinct to check on his own, knows not to flinch when something goes ka-boom. The vampire goes down with his broom-stick-handle stake to the back, his skin starting to crumple even before his body has finished falling. Outside of the room, somewhere, Stiles can hear Lydia’s scream as she senses the death he’s just caused, worries for a brief moment that the pack will think it’s one of them who’s gone and gotten themselves killed.

Isaac distracts him from that line of thought by ripping off the second vampire’s arm and starting to wallop him with it, only relenting when Liam, still clutching his shoulder, tosses over the splintered-off chair leg he’d snapped off.

“You think they’re fighting the rest of them?” Isaac asks after they watch the second vampire crumple. “Should we just wait here?”

That decision, however, is made for them by Liam, who sniffs around and shouts a garbled Mason! before darting out of the door.

“He’s technically your step-son,” Stiles tells Isaac, and the taller boy bares his fangs threateningly. They run after him.

*

The abandoned bowling alley is a disaster, half the back wall in a crumbling pile of smoking debris thanks to Lydia’s tried and true Molotov Cocktail. Even Peter had been pretty impressed when they’d figured out that the coven had eight vampires in it, since they apparently usually stuck to pairs or groups of three. One unlucky vampire had been standing too close to the wall when they’d blown it up, and when Liam comes bounding out from a door, bleeding a little but looking otherwise alright, Derek assumes the two vampires who had been unaccounted for were taken care of.

Derek helps Malia tear the arms from another vampire who’s snarling at them, and they throw the body into the lingering fire. He’s distracted, however, when he hears Stiles’ pained shout, and his head whips around until he finds him, one-on-one with half a mop as some kind of makeshift weapon. Stiles is bleeding from the back of the head and the vampire is clearly aiming to make a meal out of him, and Derek’s just about to charge over there when something blazingly sharp pricks him in the side of the neck and all he can feel is burning.

Derek wakes up on the floor next to the couch in the Hale house, which means he’s been out long enough that the pack managed to get rid of the enemy and drag him home. He’s a honestly a little annoyed he’s on the floor, probably has Jackson and Peter to thank for that, but when he manages to sit up, feeling woozy and weak in a way he’s not quite used to, he can see Stiles curled up on the couch, bruised across his jaw and head wrapped tight with white bandages. Stiles is awake, and watching him with hooded eyes the color of whiskey, and he looks contemplative in the same way he does after they have morning sex, the pale light washing through the windows up in Derek’s sorry excuse for a bedroom.

“Head count?” Derek asks, somewhat gruffly, and Stiles doesn’t even blink,  apparently expecting whatever this is going to be to start off with a status report.

“Fourteen,” Stiles says, and Derek blinks, bewildered. Headcounts are always iffy, because, depending on who you ask, certain people should be included or excluded from the tally, but the highest number is always thirteen. Stiles smirks lazily, like he also expected Derek’s confusion, and says “Jackson made a friend,” with not an inconsiderable amount of fondness in his expression that he rarely, if ever, displays for either of Derek’s two original betas.

Derek considers asking for some sort of elaboration, but he figures it’ll come out, in time. Stiles still looks thoughtful, and injured and soft and warm, and he’s tilting his head to the side, looking like he’s cataloguing Derek’s features.

“I’m in love with you,” Derek says—blurts, really. Stiles barely blinks, his expression scarcely shifting. They’ve never said it before, but apparently it’s old news. The only reaction Stiles has is the near-imperceptible quickening of his already rabbit-fast heartbeat.

“I’m going to marry you some day, Derek,” Stiles says, casual, like he’s not currently in the process of dumping Derek’s entire world on its axis. “Now come here and kiss the shit out of me.”

"Laura."

"I know, I know." She held up her hands in a placating gesture. "They just sprung it on me too. Apparently, the Taiwan office could use a fresh eye, and I was chosen to head up the team."

Although she was obviously trying to hide it, Laura was jittering with excitement as she spoke. Derek couldn't begrudge her that; she'd worked hard for almost ten years to get that marketing position, and she deserved the opportunity to succeed. Derek was proud of her, even if the timing was…inconvenient.

"Congratulations; you'll do great." She beamed at him. "I'll take care of this—" He gestured behind him, to his garage and her house. "—while you're gone. Just…not too long, okay?"

She nodded eagerly enough, and that was that. Derek tried not to worry about it.

After all, Derek had lived in an apartment for almost six years, and he'd had neighbors before. It would be fine.

***

It was not fine. Or, more accurately, it was fine for about a week and a half.

Derek met his neighbors on their second day in the neighborhood, and their first impression, while not stellar, was good enough that Derek considered them harmless. Scott seemed like a nice young man, if a little too distracted by someone he was having an intensive text conversation with, and while Stiles talked faster than almost anyone Derek had ever met and stared at Derek for an uncomfortably long time, it was clear he was more likely to talk himself to exhaustion than burn their conjoined houses down. Derek grunted out a hello and went about his business tending to the seedlings in his garden, which might've been a little rude, but he was on a schedule.

A week later, Scott and Stiles had their first college party, and Derek had to revise his initial opinion: they weren't harmless, they were loud. Their music shook the walls, vibrated in the concrete foundation, and Derek couldn't escape it. He was no stranger to noise at ridiculous times of the day and night, but it was somehow worse in the suburbs; without the sounds of the city to drown it out, Derek had no choice but to listen to keg parties and beer pong and all-night video game marathons. It was a miracle no one in the neighborhood had called the cops that first night, and then it happened again and again, always on nights when Derek had an early morning shift the following day.

By the fourth party in three weeks, Derek's patience had run out. After two hours of trying to fall asleep only to be continuously startled awake by the music next door, Derek angrily pulled on a pair of pants and marched out of his house. The winter air was biting against his bare skin, but the chill did little to cool his head during the short trip across the driveway. When he knocked on their front door, it was harder than it probably should've been, and he wondered which of his two neighbors heard it first. If Scott came to the door, there was a chance of holding his temper; Scott was still relatively nice every time Derek reluctantly spoke to him, and he would probably turn the music down. Stiles, however, seemed to have a personal problem with Derek, and there was a chance he might say no just to spite him.

The door opened, and naturally, there was Stiles, wearing a backwards ball cap and windbreaker and looking every inch the obnoxious college student.

"Uh. Can I help you?" He gave an exaggerated look of surprise, like he'd never seen Derek before in his life.

"Could you turn the music down," Derek bit out before he remembered his manners. "Please. I'm trying to sleep."

"Aw, man. Dude, do you have to be such a buzzkill?" Stiles looked extremely put out, and Derek felt a very small twinge of guilt. Miniscule, practically.

The bass continued to pound, causing something to rattle off one of the shelves in his garage, and the guilt disappeared.

"I'm not a buzzkill," he said firmly, ignoring Stiles's snort of blatant disbelief. "Some of us have to work tomorrow, and your stupid music is about to make my ears start bleeding."

"Please." Stiles rolled his eyes, and Derek wanted to strangle him. "It's not that bad, grandpa. Turn your hearing aid down, and you'll be good to go."

Scratch that—Derek was going to strangle him. His fingers were itching to do so, but as much as the urge was there, he didn't think he could bring himself to murder his neighbor at two in the morning. Too much paperwork.

"I'll call the cops," he warned instead, but Stiles didn't look discouraged at all. If anything, his eyes burned with unholy glee. "I mean it."

Stiles beamed at him.

"Sure thing, buddy. You do that."

Without another word, Stiles took a huge step back and slammed the door in his face. The music inside, if anything, only got louder.

***

Derek called the cops when he returned to his house, just as he'd said he would, but since it was a Friday night and the only emergency was the very real risk of hearing loss, he didn't think they'd be showing up immediately to deal with the noise. Derek resigned himself to being tired the next day, and he fully intended to call his HOA when he got home from work; he probably should've done it weeks ago, but he'd foolishly hesitated, remembering his own college years. Derek wondered when he'd gotten so old that too loud music and cheap beer was cause for nostalgia, and then he felt ridiculously annoyed at himself; he wasn't even thirty, for fuck's sake, but apparently all it took for him to feel like he had one foot in the grave was some college kid calling him "grandpa." Laura would be having a field day with this, and the thought made him sad; Laura was two continents away, so it wasn't like he could even call her when he couldn't sleep.

With no other options, Derek turned on the TV, intending to watch the home shopping channel until he fell asleep out of boredom. He was surprised, then, when there was a knock on his door not twenty minutes later. Derek reflexively hit mute and went to answer it; apparently, the police had made good time after all.

He was halfway there before he realized the knock had been on the door near his patio rather than his front door, and when Derek swung the door open, he wasn't surprised to see Stiles standing there, shivering despite his cap and windbreaker.

Derek leaned his forehead against the door frame and sighed, resisting the impulse to invite him in for politeness's sake; he was too tired for this.

"What. What do you want."

Stiles looked at him leaning so heavily against the wall, and his expression turned almost remorseful. It barely helped Derek's mood at all.

"Scott told me I was being a jerk, so I, uh, turned the music down. In case you were wondering why you couldn't hear it anymore."

Derek hadn't noticed, honestly, but then, he'd been halfway to buying a ridiculously expensive ladder that could hold six people. His brain was probably dribbling out his ears.

"Thanks. Now go away."

"What, you're not going to slam the door in my face?" Stiles said, lips twitching. He was clearly trying to make a joke, but Derek refused to play along. Instead, he glared at him with all the force of someone running on only two hours of sleep.

"My parents raised me better than that."

Stiles winced.

"Yeah, that's fair." Stiles made a motion like he was going to run his hand through his hair, but he was stopped by his hat. "Look, can I just apologize? I didn't mean to—okay, no, I did, but you were totally a jerk to me first! Like, since we moved in!"

Derek's eyebrows shot up his forehead. "That's an apology?"

"No, but I'm getting to it." Stiles took a deep breath, looking annoyed but determined. "Look, even if you've been a total twat about me and Scott being in your precious six figure neighborhood, I still shouldn't have been goading you deliberately. So, can we call a truce, or something?"

There were a lot of things Derek could say to that, he knew, but only one would let him close the door and get a night's sleep without guilt.

"Sure." Stiles opened his mouth to say something else in response, but Derek didn't let him continue. If he had to hear one more word about his perceived snobbery, Derek was liable to donate half his clothes to Goodwill, or something. "And it's not just my neighborhood. You're living in my sister's house. I mean, she's renting it to you."

Stiles went gratifyingly pale.

"Really?" he asked weakly, and Derek nodded.

"Really." There were a lot of things Derek could say to that, some meaner than others, but he didn't have the energy for any of them. "Just…mind the volume, okay?"

Stiles nodded vigorously and saluted him, and it was a little funny. Maybe.

"Got it. Quiet as a church mouse, I swear." He bit his lip, but it didn't completely hide his smile when he waved goodbye. "Goodnight, man. Thanks for being cool." And, without another word, he jogged over and hopped the fence separating their yards. His landing was…less than graceful, and he disappeared out of sight with a squawk. Tripped, then.

Derek laughed quietly to himself as he closed the door, and he grabbed his phone off the counter on the way back to the couch. If Stiles was going to take the initiative to apologize, Derek probably shouldn't get him fined.

***

Derek saw both Stiles and Scott more after that, although it was still mostly in passing. It was an inevitable sort of thing borne of misdelivered mail and sharing a backyard divided in two, but Derek nonetheless found himself getting used to it once the parties tapered off into a monthly event that were now always respectfully quiet. For some reason, though, he was still surprised when—five months into their lease—he realized he actually liked Stiles, probably more than was justifiable as neighbors. Despite his attempts at keeping to himself, he almost missed it when Stiles stayed out for the night and there were no sounds of him moving on the other side of the garage, and he definitely missed it when Stiles wasn't there to yell jokes over the fence while Derek was tending to his lawn. He was funny, clever in a way that made him exciting, and when he wasn't dressed like he'd fallen out of a high school sports movie, he was almost…cute. They got along and liked each other, friendly at least, and that was something of a miracle, considering Derek's track record.

It was a surprise, then, when Derek returned from his shift on Christmas Eve to find the music next door back and louder than ever. He didn't even bother to change out of his scrubs before heading to the patio and delivering a swift knock to the white paneled wood. The sound was, he hoped, loud enough to break through a drunken haze.

"Stiles? Scott?" There was no immediate response to be heard, and he knocked louder, wondering if he should go back for his key. Laura had given it to him before she left, just in case of emergencies, but it had seemed too invasive to use when his neighbor wasn't his sister.

He was a second from turning around and fetching his key anyway when the door opened to a Stiles who looked completely sober and not at all surprised to see him.

In fact, he almost looked relieved.

"Derek, there you are! I was wondering if you were coming over; did you forget what time the party started?"

Derek opened his mouth to reply but was startled into silence by Stiles leaning into his space and kissing his cheek. If he'd been confused before, he was baffled now, and it only got worse the longer Stiles lingered.

"I'm so sorry about this," he thought he heard Stiles say against his skin, but he couldn't be sure over the music. When Stiles pulled back, it was with an almost manic grin on his face, and then he grabbed Derek's hand.

"Come on, boo, I'll introduce you to the gang."

Boo? Derek wasn't so old that he didn't know what that meant, but he was pretty sure he'd remember if he and Stiles were dating. He didn't say anything, however, because Stiles's hand was slick with sweat, his grip tight enough to hurt. He was nervous, panicked, and Derek wanted to know why.

"Okay," he said quietly, and the look Stiles shot him was surprised but grateful. "Lead the way."

Stiles did, tugging him through the throng of people nearest to the door. They'd almost certainly been eavesdropping, which explained the act, but it didn't explain why Stiles kept hold of his hand even after they passed through the crowd.

A minute later, Stiles led him to a man sitting in the far corner of the living room, and Derek had his explanation.

"Derek, this is Matt. Matt, this is Derek, my boyfriend."

Matt seemed pleasant but uninterested until Stiles finished the introduction, and then his face spasmed with something dark. It put Derek on edge, all his instincts telling him that this was one creepy kid.

"Your boyfriend? No bullshit, Stilinski." He sounded skeptical and mocking, and Derek got the picture.

"No bullshit," Derek confirmed, and this time, it was his turn to lean over and give Stiles an appropriately boyfriend-like peck on the cheek. Stiles made a startled sound in response, but it was thankfully drowned out by the pounding bass and crackling speakers nearby. When he pulled back, Matt looked angry, and he quickly excused himself and left the room.

Almost immediately, Stiles sagged in relief against Derek's shoulder.

"Let me guess," Derek said quietly, just for the two of them. "A bad ex?"

"No way. Matt's this creep who used to stalk a friend of mine in high school, and then apparently decided to switch focus to me in college. He didn't believe me when I said I had a boyfriend." Stiles smiled at him, expression a little pained. "Thanks for falling on the grenade for that one, by the way. You're like the most intimidating guy I know, even when wearing scrubs with bunnies on them."

"I just got home," Derek said, a little defensively. "I'm an APRN in the Pediatrics wing, and kids love bunnies. Give me a break."

"Hey, dude, not complaining. Just…thanks, that's all. You saved my bacon."

"For now." Derek sighed; Stiles might've only made things worse with this act. "You should really call the cops. File a report, at least."

"Yeah, I know." Stiles squeezed his hand once before letting go. "I'll do it in the morning. You want a beer? Since you're here."

Derek shrugged.

"That depends on if you're offering me shitty college beer or not."

Stiles snorted, his expression fond. They'd had this conversation once before, shouted over a white picket fence.

"Don't worry, Mr. Beer Snob. I have a couple fancy beers in the fridge."

Stiles led the way to the fridge and cracked the door, his body neatly blocking the contents inside. There was the pop and hiss of an opened bottle, and  when he straightened, Derek saw that the bottle was labeled Morning Wood. Derek gave him a flat look in response, but reluctantly accepted it when Stiles held it out.

"Really, Stiles? Really?"

Stiles shot him a grin.

"What? A friend of mine picked them up in Florida. I was saving them for you." He backtracked immediately. "I mean, not for you. That would be weird, since you've never been over here before." He scrubbed a hand over his buzz cut. Oddly, he still seemed nervous. "Well. How is it?"

Derek obediently took a sip. It was interesting, layers of coffee and maple, but smooth and smoky and pleasant.

"Good." Derek took another sip, long and slow. "Best morning wood I've ever had, definitely."

Stiles's face turned bright red immediately, and he choked on nothing.

By the time he recovered, Derek was grinning behind the neck of the bottle. He couldn't help it.

"Well, I'm happy to help fix that," Stiles said, with a comical waggle of his eyebrows. "Any time."

It was Derek's turn to flush in response, and when Stiles laughed, he felt warm, pleased. He couldn't remember the last time he'd flirted with someone he actually liked, or the last time anyone had looked at him quite like Stiles was right then, sweet and genuine. It was nice.

Derek took another sip of his beer, stalling for time to find the right words.

"Well, why don't we start with numbers first. That way, you can just call me the next time you need a boyfriend."

"So…tomorrow?"

Derek smiled.

“Hello there little one, and who might you be?” Stiles squatted down in front of the girl, at least he thinks its a girl, he’s never really been any good with kids, he always felt he was going to break them. Suddenly Derek gets up from his statue state and walked over. He bent over and scooped her up in his arms.

“Wait Derek, we shouldn’t just be picking up strangers-” And before he could even finish that sentence they were suddenly in Derek’s loft. “-children. What the hell just happened? What the hell is going on?!” 

“I have no idea, but I have a feeling a witch might be behind this somehow.”

“Oh wow, look who decided to join the party, nice to see you haven’t lost that voice of yours.”

“Shut up Stiles. We need to figure out what exactly is going on and get this one back to her parents, she a werewolf, she has a pack. If that pack thinks we stole this child, we are going to have a lot more than just a witch to worry about.”

“Well then, maybe we should have thought twice before just picking up the baby.”

“Yes because I knew that the second I picked her up we would somehow end up here, and for all we know, that had nothing to do with it and we just ended up here at the same time.”

“She needs you now more than ever.”

“What the? Who the hell are you?” Out of no where there was a woman standing in the middle of the loft. And in a second, Derek had the baby girl in Stiles arms and he was standing in front of them both, claws out, teeth exposed, snarling, ready to attack at the first sign of trouble.

“Get out of my home.” Derek bits out.

“We need to talk.”

“Who are you?”

“My name is Aurora, I was the Emissary of that child’s pack.”

“Are you the one behind all this?” He motions to Stiles and the girl.

“Yes, and as I said before, she needs you, both of you.”

“Why? Why us?” Stiles calls out from behind Derek.

“Your bond is strong, she will need that love in the coming years. Her family, her pack, was destroyed, I’ve been watching you two, you fight like you hate each other, but I can see the way you two care about one another. She needs a strong pack to protect her, to shape her into the wolf she should become.”

“I’m sorry, our love? Look lady, I don’t know what special herbs you’ve been smoking, but trust me, there is nothing between us, never will be." Stiles called to her.

Derek for a moment almost looked defeated when he looked back at Stiles, disappointment filled his eyes for just a second, but disappeared in a flash. "What was that?” Stiles asked Derek as he turned back towards the witch.

“Later Stiles.”

“No, now, what was that face about?”

“I said later, drop it.”

“Nope, not happening, that face, you almost looked sad when I said that, why?”

“Because I’ve known that you never returned my feelings, okay? It just hurts having to hear it out loud. Happy? Now drop it.”

“Who said I don’t have feelings for you? This whole time I thought you were the one who never gave a crap about me. You always tell me to shut up, glare at me, who knows what else. I’ve tried to get over it, but never could, and now I learn you’ve felt the same this whole time? We could have been making out and all that other awesomely amazing things for years now?”

“What, are you five?” Derek chuckles as he pulls Stiles in for a quick kiss. “Can we please talk about this later?”

“Oh yeah, preferably without clothes on.”

Derek turned back to speak with Aurora more, but found the witch had disappeared just as quick as she appeared. “Where did she go?” Stiles asked.

“I don’t know, but I think we just proved to her why she was here to begin with.”

“So, what are we going to do with this one?” Stiles lifted the baby up a bit, causing her to giggle. “What should we name her?”

“Name? So you’re okay with this? She is a baby you know, they take lots of hard work and dedication, not your strongest trait.”

“Rude!” Stiles playfully hits Derek in the shoulder. “I work hard, when the time calls, and she seems worth it.”

“Well then, how about Claudia?”

Stiles head snaps up, hope and happiness in his eyes. “Claudia, yeah, I’m okay with that, How about you little one, do you like Claudia?” And with hearing her name, her whole face lights up with new found joy and the sweetest giggle escapes her lips and she reached for Stiles face.

“Good lord, what are we going to tell Scott?”

“One day at a time Stiles.”

“I’m not shy about it, but I always make sure nothing’s…visible. This ceremony rather makes that difficult.” Derek countered, crossing his arms.

“Yeah? Well maybe that’s the purpose of the headdress, to distract them while we’re, y’know…”

Derek chuckled, “Maybe. But seriously, you need to get dressed or we’ll be late.”

“Don’t you mean undressed? I’m pretty sure I’d be more covered if I was just naked.” Stiles scoffed. “Not that I mind, of course.”

Derek just shook his head fondly and shooed him into the adjoining room where servants were ready to fit him into his ceremonial clothes. Although, Stiles was right, there really wasn’t very much in the way of clothing, but that was also rather the point.

Stiles and Derek had been friends for many years as children, Stiles being the son of an important visiting dignitary. His father was a member of the court, and as children they would spend long hours exploring the castle and castle grounds while the adults were in their meetings and discussions. Unfortunately, the friendship was cut short when Stiles presented as an omega. They had been separated immediately, no longer allowed to interact without the presence of at least three chaperones. Stiles and his father had eventually returned to their country where he needed proper education befitting his station. And thus had begun their schooling.

Derek, whom no one ever doubted would present as an Alpha, had to attend combat training, diplomacy, history, and a number of other rather tedious courses as the crown prince that would help him in his rule as king.

Stiles, on the other hand, was taught about the delicate politics of court, as well as subterfuge, manipulation, and anything that would give him an advantage in a world where, even though omegas were considered valuable, they were also considered possessions. It was a cruel awakening, but Stiles was determined not to let anyone judge him by his gender.

At some point in his late teens, since he’d managed to avoid an official ‘presentation to society’ when he turned fourteen as was custom, he had to undergo the ball that was thrown in his favor. Soon after, he was constantly flooded by courtship proposals, all of which he ignored or outright declined. He had never expected Derek, who was a few years older than him, to be among those proposals.

However, due to a terrible bout of misfortune in which Derek’s father died of a rare disease, he inherited the throne rather earlier than he’d planned. And as such, was crowned king at the tender age of twenty-three. That coronation, however, was significant in more ways than one because otherwise, Stiles may never have known that he’d made a bid for his hand as well. However, one does not simply ignore a courtship offer from a king, and thus Stiles and his father made the journey back to reunite the long lost friends. (It should be noted, however, that they’d tried in the beginning to exchange letters, but due to their busy schedules and the rather tedious wait period between letters, the letters eventually dwindled to the point of nonexistence. A fact that they’d both rather lamented.)

It seemed that once they were reunited, they could not again be parted. Their courtship progressed rather quickly (much to the disapproval of the king’s council) and within two years they were engaged and wed under Stiles’ strict caveat, (“I’ll marry you, Derek, under the condition that no matter what, you absolutely will never tell me what to do with my own body. Agreed?”) to which Derek had gladly agreed. Since then, they’d been most happily married for the next six years until present, when Stiles reached full sexual maturity.

Now, it is a fact of omega biology, that while they might have heats as early as twelve, they are not truly fertile until the age of twenty-five, which is a blessing for many an indiscreet omega who find it easy to hide early dalliances, since no children will come of it. It also means, however, that once they have reached twenty-five, they are absolutely ridiculously fertile and any couplings, with or without the presence of their heat will almost certainly result in children. Which is why the royal household has always placed this coming-of-age in such high esteem, for it is the time in which new heirs are almost guaranteed to be conceived.

Stiles, while he understands this custom, also thinks it’s utterly ridiculous, but as the ever-loving and supportive husband he is, he is more than willing to go along with the custom of Derek’s people. Stiles’ own country has rather more…sedate…customs. None of which involve public nudity, for one.

Stiles donned the ceremonial robes, although they were absolutely nothing like robes. No, the shirt he wore was a sheer, almost transparent piece of white fabric that was attached at his neck with a silver collar and draped down and under his arms, around his torso, and was finally gathered at the small of his back. The lower half of the garment was rather like a skirt with long, flowing strips of overlapping material that trailed behind him for several feet. The skirt was made of the same material as the top, but it was through the sheer number of layers that nothing…popped out…as it were, since the strips were rather narrow. However, when he walked, the skirt would part, showing off the entirety of his legs. It was rather brilliant, actually, how the designers had managed to give the illusion of modesty, while giving the king easy access to all that lay beneath. And then he was given an elegant circlet of a metal similar to silver, but that shone much brighter and wasn’t prone to tarnishing.

Derek’s outfit was of course far more…kingly. It wasn’t really much different than what he wore on a day-to-day basis, which he was sure would annoy Stiles to no end. If anything, the tunic and pants that he wore were of a finer material and embroidered more elegantly. The major difference was that it was snow-white, whereas Derek usually never wore light colors if he could help it. And the headdress, of course, although he fully intended on wearing his crown instead.

When he was ready, Derek headed down to the throne room where he’d wait for Stiles to arrive. He didn’t have to wait long because soon Stiles was walking down the long rug that led to the throne, wearing a smug smirk and Derek felt his mouth water. The fabric flowed around Stiles’ legs and Derek could feel himself grow harder with every teasing glimpse of skin. Finally, Stiles stood directly in front of Derek, mischief dancing in his eyes before he moved forward to straddle the king, capturing his lips in a deep kiss.

Derek moaned, letting Stiles lead the kiss as their tongues twined and his fingers crept higher and higher along Stiles’ thighs. Derek suddenly thought that whoever had designed this outfit was a genius, truly. Stiles’ fingers, lithe and nimble were already tugging at the front placket of his trousers, and distantly, Derek heard the sound of the usual advisors and courtiers entering the throne room, but he couldn’t be bothered at the moment.

Stiles grinned against his mouth as he drew Derek’s length out of his trousers, pumping him once, twice, and leaving Derek shivering on his throne, feeling deceptively helpless. As the sound of petitioners grew louder as they ambled into the hall, Stiles drew back to kiss along Derek’s neck. “How do you want to do this, my king?” He asked, “Front to back? Or facing each other?” And Derek was torn with indecision. However, he knew Stiles’ proclivities, and he was always eager to indulge him.

“Front to back.” He directed, and Stiles smiled knowingly, kissing him again before twisting in his arms. Derek helped him keep his balance as he turned, as well as prevent him from exposing himself to their audience. Stiles’ skirt covered Derek’s lap, for which he was grateful as well. Soon, Stiles was kneeling to either side of Derek, but Derek knew the position wasn’t going to be comfortable for very long, especially not the hours that open court was supposed to last.

“Stand.” He nudged him, and Stiles made a small noise of realization, clambering off of the throne and parting the waterfall of fabric to expose his ass to his husband. He turned and winked cheekily, relishing in the expression on the king’s face. Derek stared at the hole presented to him, mildly startled to find it filled with a large jeweled plug. “Stiles…” He said with a choked-off moan and tugged the plug out, but not before fucking it in and out a couple of times just to see Stiles bow his head and groan.

Their audience was watching them raptly, despite not truly being able to see what they were doing, they certainly had enough of an idea, especially when Derek tugged the plug free of Stiles’ hole and set it down on one of the wide armrests of the throne. Had Stiles been in his heat, such preparation wouldn’t have been necessary, but they both had agreed that his heats were sacred to them and not something that would be witnessed by the court.

Derek tugged Stiles down onto his lap, impaling him in single fluid movement. Stiles whimpered and squirmed, adjusting to the length within him. Derek lifted Stiles’ legs to prop them on the armrests, and Stiles keened at the improved angle, shifting his hips in small, desperate motions since Derek still wasn’t moving. The strips of fabric fell between Stiles’ legs, preserving his modesty.

In the past, the ritual was performed with the participation of the court, allowing each of them to approach the throne and suck the Royal Consort’s cock for an opportunity to have their request heard. When Stiles had heard that, he’d immediately protested, saying that he only ever wanted Derek’s mouth around him. Derek had agreed, even though privately he found the though immensely arousing, the idea that an entire court full of people couldn’t bring his mate the same pleasure as his knot, since everyone knew that an omega couldn’t achieve climax through oral stimulation alone. But that was something that Derek happily kept in his fantasies and out of their bedroom activities.

Now, Stiles’ head lolled onto Derek’s shoulder as the king kissed and sucked his neck, the hands on Stiles’ hips rocking him on his cock. It was bliss that Derek never wanted to end. However, the clock tower rang, heralding the start of court. Derek looked up and nodded at one of his advisors before returning his attentions to Stiles’ gorgeous mole-dotted neck. One by one, the petitioners approached the throne, staring unabashedly at the display before them while making their pleas.

Stiles was fully hard, and he could see when he looked down that the head of his cock had protruded from the strips of fabric and was at risk of becoming fully exposed should Derek jostle him further. He found that as he stared into the lustful eyes of his Alpha’s subjects, that he couldn’t care less. Why shouldn’t he be allowed to show off some? They would never touch him, Derek wouldn’t allow it, and Stiles had a right to show off what a perfect omega he was for his king.

Meeting their eyes, he doubled his efforts, urging Derek to fuck up into him harder, and the king obliged, although his replies became more strained with the effort. Stiles ran one hand up to the side of Derek’s neck, where his bond bite was and wrapped his hand around it in a possessive gesture, even as his other hand reached down to where his cock was peeking out to uncover it and stroke himself leisurely. Derek moved his hands from Stiles’ hips to the backs of his knees, where he pulled him up and spread him open even further.

Stiles lost track of time, only knowing that the king never stopped fucking him, even though he knew Derek must be aching by now. “Alpha…” Stiles whined. “Knot me….please, alpha…” He could see some of the kings’ subjects trying to subtly readjust themselves in their trousers, while others were less subtle and rubbed at their clothed erections. All remained fully clothed, however. This was a sacred rite, not a brothel, after all.

Derek ducked his head to fit his teeth over Stiles’ bond bite, pressing down firmly as his knot began to grow. Never let it be said that he denied his omega anything. “Oh fuck yes, right there, alpha, right there!” He moaned, arching against him as the knot finally caught. “Oh fuck, oh fuck…”

Stiles rubbed at his little omega cock as Derek’s knot grew, feeling the climax grow with every passing moment until finally Derek’s knot pressed against something wonderfully perfect inside of Stiles and the omega cried out in ecstasy. Derek roared out his own release, his eyes flashing red as a warning to all other alphas in the room, staking his claim thoroughly as he pumped Stiles full of his seed.

Stiles continued to stroke himself softly through the aftershocks and let himself drift in and out of consciousness, only jerking slightly with each mini orgasm that came from being so completely filled with his alpha’s cock.

Stiles was distantly aware of the various subjects that kept approaching the throne, but none of them really registered. Eventually, he felt his alpha’s knot go down and he whimpered in protest, but soon felt the jeweled plug pressed back inside of him before Derek’s come could spill out. However, now that they weren’t tied together, he felt Derek shifting behind him, presumably tucking himself back into his trousers before gathering Stiles in his arms and cradling him close to his chest in a manner that was both protective and comforting. Stiles sighed contentedly, burying his face in Derek’s neck, content to doze off for a while longer, sated and sleepy.

Much later, Stiles felt himself lifted and carried, although he didn’t bother to open his eyes, already knowing where they were headed. Soon enough, the familiar sheets greeted him as he was laid down in their bed. He felt Derek begin to undress him, and he sighed appreciatively, eyes fluttering open sleepily just long enough to see Derek’s affectionate smile before smiling back and closing his eyes.

“At first I thought it was a joke,” Father Santiago answers, “you know, one of those toy baby-dolls that cry all the time. I thought some kid had put one in our manger display. I tried to ignore it, but the crying was getting disturbing, so I went to go try and turn it off I saw that it wasn’t a toy, it was real, it was a baby. I rushed him inside, and wrapped as best I could and called 911. Your man said I should call for you, so I did. I don’t know much about babies, but I would guess he’s just a few days old.”

“Thank you, Father,” John squeezes his shoulder briefly. “You did the right thing. Let’s go get that little guy sorted out.”

The figure in the nave turns around, and it’s Parrish. John doesn’t know how he didn’t recognize his deputy browns from the church entrance. There has always been something indistinct about Parrish, as if the edges of him are blurred in smoke, but still John should have known him.

“Parrish,” he steps up to the altar, “what’s the story? Get some paramedics in here; social services. You don’t need me for this.”

Parrish is holding the infant like a fullback carrying the football, tight and close to his body, as if he’s afraid someone’s going to strip it away from him at any moment.

“Sir,” he whispers, “this baby is running hot.”

“So call the paramedics, get Sally on the line. For heaven’s sake, Parrish, this baby needs a hospital, not the sheriff” The baby is hot to the touch but his pale eyes, when they blink open, are clear and he’s not flushed like a feverish infant would be.

“No,” Parrish hisses, “I mean this baby is running hot. I don’t think he’s human.”

John looks at the priest, still standing in the aisle, hunched in concern. He looks at the baby in his duck onesie and little yellow hat.

“Oh, fuck,” he says.

–

This is his favorite part- just the two of them lying on his bed as the morning brightens. Will is happy. He’s been fed and changed and he’s kicking his feet up as he tries to get a fist into his mouth. He makes noises- he’s not babbling, he’s way too young for that- but he’s grunting with effort as his arms flail. Derek leans close. Will smells of formula and diaper cream and himself- human and not. Derek babysat for Peter’s kids when they were young, but he doesn’t remember it being like this. Was Maggie’s skin ever this soft and perfect? Was her grip so incredibly strong? It might have been the case, but he has forgotten like he has forgotten so many of the little details about his family. He has forgotten the lullabies and the color of the nursery and if it was his Dad who bathed him every night or his Mom. So many of the minutiae that Stiles seems so interested in for some reason, that Stiles himself seems to remember about his own childhood, escapes him.

So he doesn’t know. He doesn’t know when Cora first flashed her eyes, or when his parents knew for certain that Jaimie was human and not a were like the rest of them. He could ask Peter, theoretically, but he hasn’t told Peter about Will. Peter has forfeited his right to this child. He has forfeited his right to a family. Cora, for her part,  refuses to talk about it. Even after meeting Will over Christmas, she remained silent. Derek doesn’t know how to ask. It’s possible she’s punishing him. Who knows?

Derek is alone in this.

It still seems to him almost a fever dream. He was half asleep when the Sheriff had shown up at his door a few days before Christmas holding a squalling infant in his arms.

“I’m so sorry to wake you this early, Derek,” he had said, his breath misting in the air.  “I didn’t know where else to take him.”

Derek had let him in the trailer, blinking in confusion, and heard the Sheriff out as he drank his coffee. It should have been funny, or moving even, a baby left in the manger before Christmas, but all he could think about was the cold and the fear and confusion. He held his arms out.

Nobody would mistake Will to be a Hale by blood- his skin is just a shade too dark, and his eyes, so pale in his first few weeks of life have, of late, begun to turn a deep, startling brown- but the moment he took that boy into his arms, Will was his.

The Sheriff had looked at him, watched him put the baby over his shoulder, carefully cradling his head, and stepped around the perimeter of the trailer, taking in the spare, unmade single bed and the dripping faucet; peering out the window at the building site a few feet away.

“Come on, son,” he had said, zipping his jacket. “This is no place for a baby. We have a spare room. You’ll take it until your house is up. And besides,” he added, already halfway out the door, so certain that Derek would follow him, “you don’t want to do this alone, trust me.”

So Derek had followed and now here he is and here he has been for the past month and a half, living in a strange haze of feedings and diaper changes and sleep deprivation. Nobody had warned him about the sleep deprivation.

Soon Derek will get up and go downstairs to join Stiles who is clattering around making coffee in the kitchen. Stiles doesn’t sleep well. Sometimes Derek sits up in bed, woken by some infinitesimal noise, some parental instinct didn’t know he had, to find that Stiles is already there standing over Will’s bassinet, soothing Derek’s son before he had even begun to cry.

“I’ve got him,” he whispers. “Go back to sleep, Derek.”

In the dark, in the quiet, with just the sounds of the night outside-in that great silent period between nature’s wakings- Stiles lifts Will up and holds him close, shushing and humming a wordless tune as he closes the door behind him. Safe. Safe, the darkness and the house says. Safe, says the trail of Stiles’s scent behind him. Safe. We are all safe. Derek turns around and goes back to sleep.

Soon. Soon, he’ll go down to the kitchen and Stiles will smile at them and take Will from Derek, lifting him high above his head.

“Hi, little guy,” he’ll say. “Hi there, my charming Billy,” and Derek will grumble because his name isn’t Billy, Derek’s father was never called Billy, and Charming Billy is a book about an alcoholic who is terrible to his family, but he’ll also smile in spite of himself, and pour himself some coffee and warm a bottle. He’ll sit and talk to Stiles as he feeds Will, or rather, let Stiles talk to him about his classes until the Sheriff comes down and then they’ll all get along with the business of getting along with their days.

In a few more minutes that will happen. Not just yet. He just wants to lay here for another few minutes with Will’s little, warm body close to his, his fingers clasped around Derek’s.

“Little boy, little wolf,” Derek singsongs, and Will’s eyes focus on his face. His gaze is a miracle. Please let him have this; he just wants to have one more minute in this miracle.

—

Kissing Stiles is an accident. He doesn’t mean to do it, but yesterday Stiles had come to the house and helped him pick out wood for the cabinets and granite for the counters and everything fit, and the day before he had walked with Will for over an hour as he screamed his way into a nap so that Derek could go over the paperwork from the contractor.  Derek doesn’t mean to do it, but it’s still very early and he’s still mostly asleep, and there is Stiles holding Derek’s son in the crook of his arm, just talking to him as he grabs the milk from the refrigerator.

It is a memory that isn’t even a memory, it’s a ghost- the kitchen in the morning, his mother leaning into his father’s body to kiss him. It’s not a memory, it’s an instinct. Derek leans into Stiles’s body and kisses him.

Time stops, maybe. Stiles steps back. His eyes are wide. Derek steps back. His breath is short and his fingers trail along Stiles’s arm.

“Stiles-” he starts, and Will, with impeccable timing, promptly spits up all over the both of them.

—

“Do you think I should have him baptized?”  The question is eating at him. He does not think about the kiss. He thinks about the little duck onesie and yellow hat Will was found in. He thinks about Will’s mother Derek can’t help it, he can’t help imagining what might lead someone- a werewolf or even a human- to abandon their child like that. It makes the hair stand up on the back of his neck. He knows what it means to run. He imagines her dark and small and terrified. He imagines her crawling through his window one day- tomorrow, in five years, ten years- and demanding her son. What if the church was not just an act of desperation, but an act of faith? How could he fail her in that?

The Sheriff glances up from the files scattered over the dining room table. Derek looks away, busying himself with the intricate operation that is untangling Will from the infant sling Lydia had given him without waking him up. The clock in the kitchen ticks away. Upstairs, Stiles is Skyping with Scott. Derek does not listen in.

“Were you- were you church-going folk?” the Sheriff asks.

“No. We had Christmas and Easter, like everyone else, but we didn’t- we never went to church or anything.” His family had had their own rituals. Full moons were holidays enough.

“Then I don’t see why you should have him baptized. I suppose you could talk about it with him when he’s older, when he can understand more about where he was found-give him that choice then. But I don’t see any reason why you should have to do it now if it’s not part of your heritage.”

“I just thought maybe his mom, or whoever put him there, would want that, you know?”

Werewolves could be Catholic. They could be anything. But he, he can’t. Even for Will, even for his mother, he doesn’t think he could step foot in a church. He is damned, he knows it, damned forever for everything he has done in his life.  Damned now in this moment for wishing, for hoping, that Will’s mother is dead so that he never has to explain to his son that his mother left him, so that no one could ever come and take Will away from him.  

“Son,” the Sheriff is uncurling his clawed fingers, and gently, gently lifting Will from Derek’s arms. “Derek, look at me. Look at me. Look at your boy.” Will is whimpering in his sleep. Derek did that. He did that and he could howl.

“Derek,” the Sheriff says softly,  “I know that your life hasn’t given you much reason to trust in the good things, and I can’t tell you that it’s going to be good forever. We both know that’s a promise I can’t make, but right now, Derek, right now you’ve got your boy and you’ve got us, ok? Life’s throwing you a curveball. That’s alright. Not all of them are going to knock you out. Will is fine and you are fine and you are doing a fine job.”

Now Will is pliant against Derek’s body again, his little belly rising and falling in sleep. Derek doesn’t know why. He doesn’t know how the Sheriff trusts him with this. The Sheriff clasps his shoulder and Derek thinks he may be crying, but he can’t be sure, because he hasn’t had a full night’s sleep since he got Will and everything is a bit fuzzy around the edges and he doesn’t- he can’t-

“Come on, son.” The Sheriff steers him to the living room, “why don’t you put that baby down for a bit. Go shower and take a nap. I may be old, but I’m still fully capable of keeping an eye on an infant for a few hours.” He gives him a little shove. “Go on.”

Derek goes on.

—

It doesn’t get better, it gets worse. He is not doing a fine job.  He knows he’s shifted to beta. He knows it’s a feedback loop- Will’s screams are amplified to his wolf ears and the sound of it ratchets up the adrenaline already coursing through his bloodstream and he can’t shift back. He’s on high alert and he’s ready to fight, but there’s nothing to fight, there’s just his baby’s siren wails, his tiny clenched fists, his  stomach so, so tight under Derek’s hand. Derek holds him and he walks and he walks and walks. He paces miles around the house. He sings. He rocks Will gently, taking his pain and flashing his eyes. In desperation, he even lays him down on the bed, shifts entirely, and rests his wolf head on Will’s chest. For just one moment, it works. Will startles and stops crying in surprise. He bats at Derek’s head, almost poking him in the eye, and pulls at his fur. If Derek could laugh, he would.

Then the moment passes.

The Sheriff comes home from work. Stiles comes home from his night class. Will cries. Will cries and Derek just wants to shake him quiet. He just wants to slap a hand over that little mouth, and shake him so he can have just one minute, just one minute to clear the buzz in his head. He just-

He’s in the hallway.

“Stiles,” he says, because Stiles is already there. Stiles is always there. “Stiles.” He’s left his baby. Will is all alone in the room, still screaming, still in pain.

A door opens and shuts. The Sheriff emerges holding Will and his phone.

“John,” he turns. This is it, this is the end, they’re going to call social services, they’re going to take Will. They should take Will away from him.

“I’m calling Melissa,” the Sheriff says.

“Not Deaton?” Stiles asks.

“We’ll call Deaton in the morning. Melissa can handle this. That sounds like a baby with colic and that’s a Mel problem, not a Deaton problem.“

“Can werewolves even get colic?” Stiles asks.

The Sheriff looks at Derek, but Derek is already walking away. He walks down the stairs, through the living room and out the door into the cool night air. He collapses on to the front steps, head buried in his knees.

He breathes. He breathes. His son is still screaming. He pants and he shudders.

“Derek?” The tips of Melissa’s sensible white shoes appear at the edge of his vision. He lifts his head and nods toward the house.

Melissa’s smile is kind. “Now, that sounds like a baby with colic,” she says. Her hand brushes over Derek’s head and lingers for a second as she passes him by. “It’s going to be fine.  Don’t worry.”

It’s not going to be fine. Werewolves don’t get sick; they don’t get colic. Either something is very very wrong, or Will’s not a werewolf and if Will’s not a werewolf, then there’s no reason, no reason at all for Derek to have him, but if he is a werewolf-

“Hey.” Stiles settles beside him.

“I can’t do this,” he says. “I can’t”

Stiles takes his hand.  “I was thinking,” he says. “You guys bleed, right?”

“You’ve seen me bleed, Stiles. I’ve bled all over you.”

“That means you have red blood cells, and white blood cells.”

“Ok?”

“Which means you have an immune system, just like humans have immune systems. I think yours just works faster.”

From the back of his mind somewhere it comes to him now, Cora’s small body burning up- a fever, there and gone in the course of a day.

“So he has colic. He’ll cry for a day or two and then it will be gone and you’ll survive this. This is normal. You know, my dad said that I had colic for a good two months. I cried for hours every night.”

“How?” Derek gapes. Two months, Jesus. “How did your parents do it? It’s barely been one night and I’m going crazy.”

“Lots of coffee and, evidently, earplugs. Who knew?”

“I’m a terrible father.” It’s not an answer-Stiles’s question was rhetorical anyway- but it’s the truth.  How can he be a father when most days he can’t even remember his own father’s face? How can he be a father when he is here, outside, while someone else is inside caring for his screaming child?

And yet, somehow, now, in the still night air, with Stiles thigh pressed against his own he can open his shoulders and breathe. He closes his eyes. He can hear the night birds and the raccoons that live under the porch. He can hear Stiles’s steady heartbeat, a car turning the corner a block away, Melissa’s footsteps in the house, to and fro, to and fro, and Will’s cries, still shrill and unbroken, but tapering. The tide of anxiety has washed over him, leaving a clear-headed exhaustion in its wake.

“You’re an excellent father,” Stiles says, taking his face in his hands. “You’re an excellent person,” he says again, with intent, and  kisses him.

Stiles’s heartbeat  thrums through Derek’s veins like a livewire, like a thousand cicadas in the preserve at dusk. He curls his fingers reflexively, holding on, keeping Stiles there, keeping himself steady.

When Stiles pulls back he is smiling.

“I think we should go on a date,” he says.

Derek is a werewolf. He has no family to speak of, and barely even has a pack. Until recently he had been living in a trailer. He is an unemployed, socially maladjusted, sleep-deprived single-father who never finished college. He hasn’t showered in three day, changed his clothes in two and he can’t remember the last time he shaved.

“A date?”

“Yes, a date. As I understand it a date is a social convention wherein two people who are romantically interested in spending time together spend time together.”

“I know what a date is, Stiles.”

“So, let’s get out then.”

“Stiles, I once threatened to rip your throat out.”

Stiles shrugs, “I once accused you of murder. Come on, it will be nice. Dad will take Will for a couple of hours, we’ll get dressed up in real clothing and go out to dinner like real live adults. Maybe I can even get you to trim that awful thing on your face,” he combs his fingers through Derek’s beard.  “You look like a hockey player with a playoff beard.”

“I probably smell like one, too,” he says, and Stiles snorts. “Ok,” Derek says finally, extracting Stiles’s hand from his facial hair so he can cradle it in his palm. “Yes. Let’s go on a date.”

“Good. Yes. Good.”

“Good,” Derek agrees.

“Oh wait,” Stiles is pulling something out of his back pocket. It’s a crumpled piece of red construction paper, unevenly folded and wearing at the edges. “That’s been sitting there all day. I totally forgot to give it to you.” He holds it out to Derek.

Derek takes, and turns it over a few times before opening it up and smoothing it out on his knees. It smells of warm denim, Stiles and Will.

“Happy Valentines Day,” Stiles says.

“It’s Valentine’s Day?” Derek didn’t even realize it was February.

“Yup. And that’s a Valentine from me and Will.”

The blue crayon is barely legible on the dark red paper, but Derek can make out a badly drawn heart with the words, “Be Mine” scrawled in Stiles’s chicken-scratch handwriting. Below it is a tiny blob of yellow paint. It is almost a handprint.

“This is really great.” Derek smiles. “Thank you, Stiles. Happy Valentine’s Day.”

Stiles shrugs and flushes. “Will’s really wiggly and he doesn’t like paint, but it’s ok, I guess.”

Derek laughs, because he can. It is suddenly very, very quiet. The silence is the best things he’s heard in days and days.

“I think he’s stopped.”

“Oh, thank God,” Stiles breathes. “I was seriously considering sleeping in my car tonight. God bless Melissa.”

“If I were God I’d give her Sainthood.”

“I think the Catholic Church does that, not God.”

“Whatever.”

“You want to go in and check on him?”

Will’s heart beats slow and steady in the living room. The Sheriff’s heartbeat is measured and even somewhere nearby. He must have fallen asleep on the couch. Melissa is washing dishes in the kitchen. Derek knows he should go help her, but he can’t make himself move just yet.

“Nah,” he says, resting his head on Stiles’s shoulder and closing his eyes. “Let’s just stay here a little bit. Just for a little while.”

—

Derek was wrong. This is his favorite part.

It’s just light when he wakes to the sound of Will gurgling and cooing to himself in his bassinet. He’s been doing that more and more often now- waking happy. Derek extracts himself from under Stiles’s limbs and sits up.

“Baby,” Stiles mutters and Derek whether he’s talking to him or to Will. It’s a moot point, because Stiles’s eyes don’t even open, they just flutter, moving rapidly under his eyelids, and then he turns over and is asleep again.

Derek pads over to the bassinet and lifts Will up into his arms. “Hey there, guy,” he whispers. “Hey there, little wolf.” Will laughs and stuffs his fist into Derek’s mouth.

It’s too early to get up, so he changes Will and then climbs back into bed and settles against the headboard, balancing Will on his updrawn knees. Will’s dark eyes are trained on Derek’s face.

“Now,” he tells Will, “we have to be quiet. We don’t want wake Stiles up. He’s very tired.”

“Too late,” Stiles groans and rolls onto his side, propping himself up on an elbow so he can blow raspberries into Will’s chubby legs. “Hello, Will, my charming Billy, William the Conqueror. Good morning.”

Will chortles and Stiles laughs and the scent of all three of them is all over the room. Three miles away, on the edge of the preserve, there is a house. It’s not a big house, but it’s big enough. Now, the sunlight will be creeping across the kitchen, illuminating the whorls in the wood flooring. Now the curtains in the master bedroom will be dancing in the breeze. It will be a little cold when they get there later in the day, but it will smell like fresh rain and grass. Soon it will also smell like them.

It took him a few seconds to realize that while Derek had been internally monologuing his shitty luck, he had also apparently been in a motionless state of fugue… finger reaching out towards the panel… but not actually moving forward to push anything. He cleared his throat and shook off his embarrassment.

“Sorry. For both.”

He made a vaguely wavy motion with his finger towards the door of the elevator to refer to their run-in before punching the panel for the lobby. There was a small up-tick of a grin on the other man’s face… like maybe Derek had just done something inadvertently adorable or ridiculous. A tiny swarm of butterflies flickered to life deep in his gut. Maybe this wouldn’t be as completely horrible as he’d feared.

The closing doors were halted at the last second by a manicured female hand, and all his hopes were dashed.

“Derek! Don’t you fucking walk away from me!”

The butterflies died a quick and horrible death, sinking into the pit of his stomach to form a tight wad of anxiety instead. Well, shit. Kate practically slithered onto the elevator dressed to the nines in her blood red dress and matching talons. Without even realizing he was doing so, Derek took a quick step back towards his favorite sexy stranger. It was only when their arms brushed that he noticed how close they were.

“What do you want, Kate? I have more important things to do than cater to you.”

She scoffed as the doors closed quietly behind her.

“You? Cater? Please, Derek. You wouldn’t know how to make someone else happy if your life depended on it. You’re too caught up in your own self-righteous misery.”

He flinched. He couldn’t help it. His gaze was set firmly to the descending buttons of light on the elevator panel.

“Poor Derek. Poor Derek with his scars and his little dead family. I was the best thing that ever happened to you, and I’m sick and tired of constantly watching your back as you walk away from me. You owe me—”

“Are you fucking kidding me right now?”

The deep male voice that had spoken made Derek jump. He’d almost forgotten about the witness to his continued humiliation by one Kate Argent. A surprisingly strong-looking arm flung forward, fist smashing the button for the elevator to stop. It halted movement with a groan and an alarm. Kate blinked a couple times in surprise before turning the ugliest sneer Derek had ever seen on her face towards his would-be crush.

“Mind your own damn business, Stilinski.”

The name sent a jolt through Derek’s nerves. He had never had one to match the face before… but S. Stilinski had often popped up on some of the receipts he processed through payroll. He just had no idea that Kate might have known him. But he supposed it wasn’t that large of a company. And Derek didn’t really have the time to get to know people from other departments. Okay… so… he mostly just kept to himself.

“This is my business, Kate. You can’t just talk to people however you want. And I know for a fact that Derek doesn’t owe you jack shit.”

Kate’s eyes thinned down to dangerous lines.

“And how’s that, Stiles?”

Stiles… and what the hell kind of name is Stiles… cocked his head to the side and pressed himself further into Derek’s personal space.

“Because you’ve never helped another human being in your life, besidesyourself, so I can’t imagine you providing anything of value to the lovely Mr. Hale, here.”

Derek’s heart just punched through his rib-cage. He was pretty sure of it. There was definitely a painful thump. Before another word could be uttered in the frozen elevator, a tiny voice peeped out of the emergency speaker next to the stop button.

“Is everyone okay in there, folks?”

The solid arm against Derek’s suddenly shifted and long fingers were tangling with his own in a death grip.

“Hey, Frank! Yeah… we’re okay. Just Kate Argent throwing her substantial weight around and threatening my boyfriend. Can you be a buddy and give Allison a call? As the head of HR, I’m sure she would be very keen to discuss this situation.”

Derek’s fingers had spasmed and clenched when the word boyfriend rolled off Stiles’ tongue with a fluid grace that spoke of complete comfort and truth. For a single moment of complete and utter silence… Derek tried to figure out exactly what the fuck had happened to his life in the last thirty seconds of it. Because it boggled. It boggled. Then all hell broke loose.

‘Frank’… acquiesced to Stiles’ request. Stiles rolled his shoulders and smiled with a confident charm. Kate screeched out some words that were dirtier than her soul. And Derek blinked. Twice. (He felt the situation demanded the second.)

Kate was still spewing vitriol as she leaned over to smack the elevator back into life. It was something about disbelief and lying and some such… but with a tiny nudge of an elbow, Derek had focused all his attention on the man standing beside him. He’d finally lifted his gaze to meet Stiles’ amber eyes. The man’s really really ridiculously sinful lips parted with a playful grin.

“Where were you planning to take me to lunch today, Der-bear? Capanelli’s? Or… we haven’t gotten sandwiches at Thundercloud in ages. I know how much you love the office special. That sound okay?”

Derek could only nod in response, which lit Stiles’ eyes up like fairy lights and he leaned forward slowly.

“Thanks, babe. You spoil me.”

He didn’t know what made him say it, really. Except that the doors were opening and Kate was about to step out… and he didn’t really want her to think she’d won in any way. So he smirked at Stiles and out popped the first thing that came to his mind.

“Yeah, well, the sex is good. Guess you deserve it.”

Kate tripped over her own stiletto on the way out. The elevator door closed behind her and Stiles immediately crowed with laughter. Derek’s chest felt light and his mouth was tipping up into a grin when the elevator suddenly shuddered and stopped all on its own. They both tilted their heads slightly and turned towards the panel. After only a few seconds… Frank was back.

“You still in there, Stiles?”

Stiles sighed.

“Yeah. Me and Derek Hale from Accounting. What happened?”

Frank made a frustrated noise through the small speaker.

“That damn number three you’re on. It’s the most finicky bastard we have. S’probably because you used the emergency stop. Shouldn’t take us more than twenty minutes tops to get you out of there. Sorry, fellas.”

Stiles shrugged his shoulders and smiled. It was then that Derek realized they were still holding hands.

“No problem, Frank. Do what you gotta do.”

Only at that moment, did Stiles turn back towards Derek and sort of… pause in motion. His eyes went wide and a high-pitched giggle burst out of him. He didn’t, however, release his fingers from the strangle hold they had on Derek’s. A pleasant blush bloomed across his cheeks all the way down his neck.

“Oh. Oh my god. I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to just hop right in there and do that. Or to take over the conversation or anything. It’s just that Kate Argent is a cancer to all humankind and I get so tired of hearing about the things she’s said and done. Poor Allison is constantly going on about her and when she brought up your family… well… I just couldn’t…”

Stiles’ voice petered off to nothing, and Derek couldn’t even begin to imagine what his own face must be doing to bring his words up short. But Derek didn’t want to talk about his family at the moment. Or the fire. Or the burn marks that littered his arms. There’s only one thing he really wanted to know about.

“You. You know me? Who I am?”

Stiles shrugged a little and his gaze dropped away.

“My dad’s the Sheriff so… I know about…”

There was a dull pain somewhere in the middle of Derek’s chest cavity. He tried to pull his fingers away.

“Oh. Right.”

The hand gripping his refused to let go and with a strange, vague hand movement that Derek couldn’t even begin to interpret… Stiles was back in his face with warm eyes and pink-cheeked.

“No no no… that’s not why… I mean… I know you HERE because—because you’re like this thing everyone always whispers about at the water cooler, if you get what I mean.”

Derek attempted to pull his hand away again. His voice came out just this side of strangled and cracked.

“Because I’m a walking tragedy?”

Stiles tugged his hand back towards his own body.

“Are you—? No, you dumbass… because you’re this gorgeously perfect GQ model. Like a—a stunning piece of art that everyone is dying to touch, but is afraid of spoiling. Jesus, Derek… more than half of this entire building wants to bang you like a screen door!”

Derek’s whole body kind of startled and jerked at the words. He could feel his face flushing in embarrassment. What the ever loving fuck is this day!? Seriously!!! Stiles’ blush was just as neon as Derek’s own must be and neither of them spoke for a couple moments.  The other man obviously was incapable of remaining still for long, because his free hand came up and began to fiddle with Derek’s captured fingers.

“I’ve seen you all around town, you know? I mean I… notice you. Everywhere. But you’ve never really noticed me. Don’t even glance my way. Still… I wasn’t going to let Kate talk to you like that. I’m sure I probably overstepped my bounds, you’re probably pissed at me, huh? She could actually be your friend. Or… or a girlfriend.”

That last sentence had an invisible question mark attached to it. But Derek didn’t miss it. He groaned softly under his breath.

“No. Jesus. I try to avoid relationships with she-devils. She just… got me the job here, then got pissed when I didn’t feel that should be rewarded with a date… or sex. She’s not very good at taking no for an answer.”

Stiles hummed softly under his breath, but his smile was back, as was the warmth in his eyes.

“So. Single then?”

Derek gave an affirmative nod before sucking his bottom lip into his mouth to chew on it. There was a flirty tint to the expression Stiles currently wore… and damn if this epically shitty day may be turning around really fucking quickly. Stiles’ grin only grew as Derek felt himself blush even brighter.

“The offer of lunch could be taken as genuine, in that case.”

With a subtle tilt of his head, Derek indicated the closed doors.

“Sort of stuck in an elevator at the moment.”

Stiles’ wide grin lit up his face, and Derek could really get used to this. The younger… probably?… man promptly dropped to the ground and crossed his legs.

“That only means we get extra time to talk, right?”

The smile Derek could feel on his face was likely the most genuine one to grace his features in the last two years. So he slowly allowed his legs to bend beneath him, and settled down facing Stiles.

“What should we talk about, then?”

Stiles shrugged with over-blown nonchalance before he reached forward to snag Derek’s right hand and resume playing with his fingers.

“Well… between Kate and Frank, I’d say the entire building is going to know about our clandestine relationship by the time we spring this joint. So we should probably start with… everything, huh?”

Derek ducked his head and chuckled softly. Definitely a day for the record books. Shortest amount of time from terrible to awesome. Measured in a single elevator ride. He wondered how much it would piss Kate off to send her a thank you card.

Stiles at 10 with a dead mother didn’t care. Stiles at 20, orphaned and working on his medical degree could not care less.

“I still can’t believe you didn’t tell me she worked there. How was Isupposed to know?” Scott glares at Stiles form on his bed. “And to top it off, you told her about Allison. Amazing. The amount of productivity from you today was amazing.”

Stiles sits up and gives him a bemused stare.

“What would you rather have had me tell her? She’s your cousin? Sister? Do you know how Kira would feel if she found out the truth, and don’t play me, she definitely would’ve found out, I don’t know what you take her for, seriously. Why were you even withAllison?”

“We were reconciling.” Scott sighs and lays down next to him. “She’s dating Isaac now, of all people.”

“Another person I don’t know about.”

“He’s a friend.”

“Some friend.”

Scott drags a hand through his hair. “He’s a good guy, I just thought he might’ve mentioned something like this.”

Stiles blinks. “Whoa, he’s the dude that was your roommate for a while, right? Man, that’s shitty.”

“Right?”

“Yep.” He falls off the bed and crawls towards his bag to pull his laptop out. “Hey, didn’t you have to go meet with the Alpha today? How’d it go?”

Scott scrambles off the bed and grabs his jacket.

“Fuck!”

…

Stiles’ is pretty sure his eyes are gonna start streaming any second, but goddammit, he is not going to blink before this she-wolf does.

Said wolf’s lips curl up into a smirk like she knows he’s gonna give upright now and Stiles eye fucking twitches, and right then the door opens with a slam.

They both rear back in surprise, heads whipping towards the people coming out, blinking rapidly. The she-wolf briskly walks towards the group, scrubbing a gloved hand through Stiles hair on the way. Stiles goes to Scott - he’s always been easy to spot, laid-back posture and easy going smile.

And suddenly Stiles is tripping over literally nothing, because he meets eyes that are green and brown and blue -  the same eyes he has come to love over the years, the same sun-kissed skin he sees at night, the same jet black hair. He staggers heavily and wrenches his gaze away, his hand shooting out to hold Scott in a steel grip.

“Could we step outside for a moment?” Stiles smiles as charmingly as he can as with black spots starting to appear in his sight. “Scott, now,if you please, or we are going to have a very embarrassing and emotional crisis right here.”

Scott has to sense that he’s panicking, because he throws an arm over Stiles’ shoulder, throws an apologetic grin at whoever he’d been talking to, and steers them both towards the exit.

“Breath,” Scott urges, “Deeply.”

“I'm trying,” Stiles snaps.

His vision clears quicker than he thought it would, and Scott’s concerned face comes in view. They’re sitting outside on the curb.

“Is he okay?” There’s a girl behind Scott who looks eerily familiar. Whoalso happens to have jet black hair, he notes.  

Who the fuck.

Scott holds up two digits. “Stiles, how many fingers?”

He squints. “Uh, twelve.”

The girl’s holding up all ten behind Scott, but Scott isn’t looking at her and stares at his fingers in panic. The girl’s canines stand out when she grins.

“Yeah, buddy, I’m okay now.” He blinks a few times. “I think.”

“What happened?”

Stiles stares blankly at him. “If this is you trying to give me the illusion of privacy, it’s not working. There are werewolves inside, I’d rather not here and now.”

“But I can’t drive you back yet,” Scott says worriedly, “We have to go over a few more things so you’ll have to give me something, man.”

Stiles squints up at the sun.

“I, uh- I may have just seen my soulmate.” Stiles rubs his face. “This is so embarrassing.”

Scott’s jaw drops. Raven Head’s eyebrows pass through her hairline.

“Dude, who was it?”

He pats his best friend’s cheek. “Werewolves inside, Scottie. Not now, okay?”

Scott yanks the collar of Stiles’ shirt down to get a clearer view of his mark. The girl’s eyes widen.

“It hasn’t even cleared up yet!” Scott says in disbelief. “Stiles, your mark is supposed to clear up within twenty four hours before you meet them.”

Stiles places his foot firmly on Scott’s chest and pushes hard.

“Oh, so you’re saying its my fault? Like, Heavens forbid, I may havemistaken it? Or worse, I'm lying?”

Scott gives him an upset look.

“I didn’t mean it like that and you know it.”

Stiles breathes deeply again. “Yeah, whatever. Go back inside and finish your wolfie business.”

The girl steps forward and offers Stiles a hand.

“Laura Hale.”

Stiles very carefully accepts her hand and pulls himself up, warily keeping eye contact with her while he dusts his pants.

(He’s heard stories about this woman okay, she’s supposed to be pretty terrifying. Or so Scott says. And Scott’s a reliable source. Sometimes.)

“Stiles.”

“I’d love to stay and get to know you-” Stiles refrains from snorting, and Laura smirks, “-but duty calls. Do come along with Scott next time. I’m sure you’d be very useful.”

Stiles watches her with wide eyes as she leaves. As soon as Laura’s out of sight, Stiles punches Scott in the arm, just hard enough to hurt. Scott pouts. Stiles relentlessly glares back.

“Did you tell them? About-” He gestures wildly at himself.

“You know I wouldn’t. Please tell me now?” Scott begs.

Stiles sighs and rummages his pockets for the small notebook that he always carries with him and scribbles on a page.

“Don’t freak.” Stiles warns.

Scott stares at the name written on the paper for a good few seconds. Stiles hadn’t thought his eyes could get any wider, but yep, they’re still going.

“Dude, look at me.”

Scott looks at him with terror.

“Stiles. Bro. Oh my God. Bro.”

“Go inside, they’re waiting for you, Jesus, go, we can talk about this later.”

Stiles end up having to push him through the door. He pinches Scott’s cheek.

“Don’t be weird, okay? Meaning no staring at the person or initiating anything with them, like conversations. I’ll be fine.” He rubs Scott’s hair and he visibly relaxes. “Shoo.”

Stiles goes back to where he was sitting before, across the she-wolf. She’s making her way back as well and they stare at Scott zombie-walk away. She raises an eyebrow at Stiles and he reels in his emotions subtly, not wanting everyone within the compound to sense his panic. She-Wolf tilts her head.

“I’m Erica.”

“Stiles.”

“I know.” She settles comfortably in the chair next to him instead of sitting across. “Me and Scott talk sometimes, when the meetings get boring.”

“How come you’re not in with the rest of them?”

Erica laughs. “I begged Laura to let me stay on guard this time. Those meetings can be hell. All-” She waves her hands, “-growly and shit. Not that you’d know.”

Stiles’ grin stops halfway when he’s struck with a thought. Which goes something like this;

Laura Hale saw my mark. Derek Hale is my soulmate. These two are siblings. Laura Hale will definitely tell Derek Hale.

Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck. Fuuuuuck. Oh my fucking-

He rushes outside the building again.

…..

After the rest of the meetings are over and most of the people have left, Laura heads up after Derek to their small apartment. The owner of the building is a Water Nymph, who let them have their meetings in the basement of the building. People rarely use it, and he’d said that the old meeting place for the supernaturals in the area was under inspection anyway, since police had found a considerable amount of blood after a brawl.

Of course, the blood didn’t belong to any humans, but the police didn’t know that and they let them be.

“Derek, come here for a sec, will you?”

He moans from the other room.

“Is it urgent?”

“Yep.”

The bed creaks. Derek shuffles out of his room, scratching his cheek. Laura doesn’t stop her smile. Shaking her head at her the fondness curling up in her gut, she motions for Derek to tilt his head up. Derek doesn’t move.

“Aw, c'mon,” She crosses her arms. “I only want to see your mark, I’m not gonna disfigure it or something.”

Derek glares. Laura levels him with a frosty stare.

She’s impressed when even that doesn’t get him to relent. Like, she isstill the Alpha, right?

“Okay, well,” Laura shrugs off her jacket, “I did ask.”

She leaps on him.

“Get the fuck off, what is wrong with you, ow.”

“Show me,” She demands. Derek wiggles beneath her, trying to get into a position that’d make it easy to throw her.

“Fuck you.”

Laura firmly sits on his stomach, pins his arms with her hand and the other with a foot and forces his chin up with her free hand. She scrutinizes the mark a bit underneath his jaw while Derek blows air out of his nose in defeat.

She’d envied Derek’s mark when she was younger - it always looked beautiful in comparison to her whispy knots. His was all mangled up, twists and turns here and there, nothing readable, curving beautifully at every turn.

It looked exactly like Stiles’.

“Yes.” Laura crows. She let’s go of Derek long enough for him to sit up and stare at her like she’s gone insane. Laura feels a bit like crying and wraps her arms around him.

“Oh Derek, you big baby, smile!” She squeezes the back of his neck. “I’ve found your soulmate! Soul-mate! How awesome is that?”

Derek passes out.

Laura slaps her forehead.

…..

Derek’s head is pounding when he wakes up. For a werewolf, it’s a pretty foreign feeling.

“Laura.”

She doesn’t answer. Derek can’t even hear her heartbeat.

He walks briskly towards the fridge, shoulders only relaxing when he sees a bright pink post-it note on it.

Gone to get groceries, don’t take any pills if you have a headache, will be back soon.

Derek’s still reading the note when he hears her come in.

“I BROUGHT COFFEE.”

He eagerly follows the smell of it.

“Why are you shouting?”

“I MAY HAVE HAD A FEW SHOTS OF ESPRESSO.”

“Jesus, Laura, go drink some water.”

“I TOLD SCOTT TO MEET US AT THE NEXT SPN MEETING.”

“Stop yelling, I’m literally right here. And stop calling them that.”

“I WILL NOT.” Laura declares. “Sorry, just excited to meet your soulmate.”

“I don’t want to meet them,” Derek snaps, “You can go yourself.”

Laura hums. “It’s a him, for the record, and you are coming with me, and I will emotionally blackmail you if I have to,” She passes him his coffee and adds, “I shit you not.”

Derek sinks into a chair and throws her a pitiful look. “I really don’t want to.”

Laura’s relentless. “Too bad.”

“What if I don’t like him?”

“He might not like you.”

“All the more reason, to you know, not go.”

“You’re going,” Laura says firmly, “I already told Scott and he agreed.”

Derek gives Laura a horrified look. “It's Scott?”

“Scott’s a sweetie babe, you’d only be so lucky if it were him.” She says dryly. “It’s his best friend, Stiles.”

Now Derek looks terrified.

“The human?”

“Yep.”

“Same one who had a panic attack yesterday?”

Laura gives him a disapproving look and he slams his head on the table.

…..

You’d think they’d meet within a week after they’d found out they were each other’s soulmates, but it wasn’t until the next meeting of the supernaturals that they saw each other again. Which ended up being roughly a month.

The silence would seem funny to Stiles if this was someone else, but no, this is his life. And his soulmate. This is so unfunny at the moment, he wants to dig a hole with his own hands. Or run like an idiot, even knowing he can’t outrun anyone in this compound.

His magic pumps harder and harder through his body the more anxious he gets and he thinks maybe he might just be able to swing it.

Fuck Scott, seriously. Stiles didn’t agree to this, he did.

He gloomily thinks of ways he can make Scott suffer while Laura walks towards them, Derek trailing behind her, hands in his pockets. Stiles’ veins feel like they’re on fire, and Derek is watching him like he can see them.

Which is frankly ridiculous, his brain supplies, Werewolves have better eyesight than humans, yes, but none of them can actually look through a human’s skin. Or anything’s. What even is his eye color. Fifteen years of seeing the same thing and I still don’t have a name. Laura’s eyes are different though, hers are completely blue, which doesn’t make her any less attractive, of course, but pales in comparison to Derek’s, and haha, I don’t think I took my meds, shit.

Stiles doesn’t understand why nobody’s sending him weird looks. Scott and Laura are talking about some Alpha thing they both have and Derek actually half-smiles at him when he comes back down. Stiles’ gut churns.

It doesn’t feel awkward, even though they’re both just sitting there, watching Scott and Laura talk animatedly. Stiles wants to ask if Derek wants to leave and go somewhere else to talk, and as soon as he opens his mouth, Derek does too, and Laura and Scott swivel their heads to stare at them.

They both shut their mouths with identical clacks. Stiles subtly gives Scott the finger while Derek glares at Laura. Standing up, Stiles swings his jacket on and heads towards the exit, seeing without really looking that Derek does the same.

Stiles stops at the door and turns around to give Scott a stern look.

“Don’t follow us. And stop her from following, too.”

They don’t stay to hear Laura’s indignant squack.

…..

They stop in front of the road, with a crowd of other people waiting to cross. Stiles smiles crookedly.

“Could you jump to the other side?”

Derek snorts. “I’m a werewolf, not a kangaroo.”

Stiles huffs out a laugh and suddenly doesn’t understand why he was so terrified of this soulmate stuff. The light turns red, and the crowd pushes them forward. Neither have any specific place in mind, and they keep walking past cafes and restaurants and small shops.

“Have you eaten?”

They head to a 24/7 diner near Stiles and Scott’s apartment.

Stiles keeps waiting for the right time to drop the bomb. Or for Derek to drop it. If he has, you know, even seen Stiles in his dreams for the past decade and a half. Which is unusual for even soulmates.

A voice keeps chanting in his head, telling him Derek’s probably never seen him before in his life. Stiles wonders if Derek will run if he tells him.

“I saw your parents die,” Derek blurts out.

Stiles’ burger slips from his fingers and he presses the heels of his palms to his eyes.

“Thank God. I watched your house burn, so I guess we’re fair.” He swallows half of his soft drink in one go. “Like, not actually in front of it, but-”

Derek looks relieved. “Through a vision or through my eyes, yeah. Sorry about your parents.”

Stiles snorts, causing Derek to grin. “Yeah, you too, buddy.”

They end up staying till two in the morning.

…..

Scott hears clattering outside his room. Too sleepy to identify who it is, he silently opens his door and heads towards the kitchen, holding Stiles’ bat.

He sees Derek on a counter, head tilted up, Stiles’ mouth on his jaw and no hands in sight.