#alpha!laura

Okay, realistically, she knew why. Her mother was a very busy woman with a lot of things on her plate that were more important than teaching a free-but-donations-appreciated Werewolf For Dummies course. The Hales were the largest, oldest, and most knowledgeable werewolf pack in the state, much less the city, and there simply weren’t that many people in town qualified to give reliable information to impressionable new wolves. If there were, the class probably wouldn’t be in such high demand.

Laura, as a Hale, was one of those people. And Laura, as an alpha in her own right, was uniquely suited to soothing and guiding the lost, anxious, occasionally traumatized young people who came to them for help.

She didn’t even mind teaching it, most of the time. There was a lot of fulfillment to be found in providing that help. There was nothing better than the joy on a teenager’s face when he finally managed to flash his eyes on purpose for the first time, or the relief of a terrified kid realizing that what had happened to her wasn’t the death sentence she’d thought it was. Some days, Laura went home feeling like an absolute hero.

Other days, like this one, she wanted to put her head through a wall.

“Erica, stop sniffing your classmates,” Laura said, going for stern but pretty sure she landed on annoyed instead.

Erica popped her gum but leaned back out of Scott’s personal space. “That’s a dumb rule. What’s the point in being able to smell things about people if you’re not ‘allowed’ to?” she asked, air quotes and all.

Laura pinched the bridge of her nose. “It’s not a rule. It’s just rude.”

Beside her, Peter snorted. Of course he did. He could never keep his nose out of anyone’s business, either figuratively or literally. Hence him being here in the first place, sitting in on Laura’s class as a self-proclaimed “expert” and uninvited guest speaker. Derek, here because he’d forgotten to do the dishes last night and mom was punishing him by inflicting his presence on Laura and her students, flicked him in the ear.

“He smells weird,” Erica whined, sending Scott a dirty look like he was doing it on purpose.

“He smells anxious,” Derek muttered without looking up from his phone.

Scott made an indignant noise. “Of course I do! The full moon is coming up!” He turned his big brown eyes to Laura and said, with all the earnest concern of someone who knew nothing reliable about werewolves, “Am I gonna try to kill someone?”

“Yes,” Derek said.

Laura smacked him in the chest hard enough to make him drop his phone. “No!” She smiled at Scott, who—along with half the other kids here—looked absolutely stricken by Derek’s deadpan answer. “No, Scott. The rumors about bloodlust on the full moon are wildly exaggerated. There will be an increase in aggression, yes, and a loss of impulse control. But if you take the proper precautions, these can be managed. And, with proper training, it should only take a few months before the full moon stops being overwhelming and you’ll be able to remain in complete control of your faculties.”

Scott settled back into his seat looking halfway reassured. A few of the others let out sighs of relief as well. Derek was back to texting. Peter opened his mouth to add something that was almost guaranteed to be unhelpful, so Laura stepped on his foot as casually as she could on her way to the other side of the room.

“Any other questions?” she asked gamely.

Liam, the youngest member of this particular batch, thrust his hand into the air.

“If I stay in the beta shift too long,” he said, “will my face get stuck like that?”

The class erupted in worried muttering. Apparently, most of them had never even considered the possibility of such a thing happening, but now that they thought about it, it was extremely concerning.

“I vote we go back to Scott’s question,” Peter put in, kicking his feet up on Laura’s desk. “It was less stupid.”

“Nobody asked you, Peter.”

“You know, I heard that happened to cousin Elroy,” Derek said idly. He grinned at Liam. “Aunt Gertie warned him, but, you know…kids. They never listen.”

Liam looked horrified.

“Oh, for the love of god,” Laura groaned. “Derek, we don’t have a cousin Elroy. Why do I get the feeling you’re not taking this seriously?”

He transferred his grin to her, sweet as pie. “Because I don’t want to be here.”

Peter raised his hand. “I do.”

“You are not helping, Peter.”

“Ooh, ooh, I have a question!”

A raised hand flailed wildly in the back row of seats and Laura was left to question how this class had gotten so far out of her control. She leaned back against her desk, rubbed at her forehead to ward off the headache an alpha werewolf shouldn’t even have been able to get, and said, “Stiles, how did you get in here?”

The human boy in question shrugged. “I’m friends with Meredith at reception.”

Scott turned all the way around in his seat to say, “I thought Meredith hated your guts.”

“I’m an acquired taste,” Stiles said with a wink. “I’m growing on her.”

“This class is for newly bitten werewolves,” Laura told him, just as she had the last four times he’d snuck into one of her lessons. “There’s a support group for family and friends on Wednesdays, and an FAQ and a forum for any questions you may have. So, unless you got the bite sometime in the last week—”

“No!” Stiles squawked. “I have not been bitten, but—”

“Would you like to?” Peter asked with an unmistakable leer.

“Peter, get out.”

With a sigh so dramatic it deserved an Oscar nom, Peter slunk out of his chair toward the door. “Fine,” he said. “I suppose I’ll take my lifetime of experience and expertise somewhere it will be appreciated. Stiles, feel free to call me personally for any further questions, comments, or concerns.”

Stiles flipped him the bird while Scott made exaggerated retching noises and Laura wished fervently that she’d been born to a different family.

“On that note,” Derek said, shoving his phone in his pocket, “I think this class is over.”

“We’ve still got ten minutes,” Laura tried, but he just snorted.

“Sure, if you think you can follow that.”

Erica was out the door, hot on Derek’s heels with bubble gum popping. The rest of the class was quick to take the cue. Laura didn’t bother trying to stop them. It’s not like this class was mandatory or even paid for. She sank down at her desk and let her forehead drop onto the wood with a thump. It may have been a disaster of a lesson, but at least Cora hadn’t been there. Cora was too much of a troll to be allowed within ten feet of this classroom, no matter how many dishes she didn’t do. The last time she’d “helped out”, she’d convinced all the students all that they were going to grow tails.

A cleared throat distracted Laura from her misery. She raised her head to see Isaac. He was one of the older members of the class, in the sense that it had been three months since he was bitten. Most new wolves only came a few times before they felt that they had a grasp on the basics. Isaac had never so much as raised his hand in the months he’d been coming to her class, but he was always present and attentive.

Laura sat up straight, tucking her hair behind her ear and dragging up a smile. “Isaac. Did you have a question for me?”

“No,” he said, voice soft. “I just wanted to show you…”

Isaac held up his right hand. A second later, his bitten-short fingernails had been replaced by long, sharp claws.

“I couldn’t do that a week ago,” he told her. “But how you explained it to Malia on Tuesday made a lot of sense. I practiced it that way for a while, and I think I’ve got it now.”

Laura beamed. "Oh, Isaac, that's wonderful!"

Isaac smiled back at her, shy but obviously responsive to an alpha's praise. He pulled his claws back in, hand falling to wrap around the strap of his messenger bag. The other hand ran through his hair, leaving his mop of curls in disarray.

“Yeah, so, um… I just wanted to say thanks. For everything you do here.”

He beat a hasty retreat before Laura could respond, even that much interaction apparently too much for him. Laura watched him go with a warmth in her chest that not even her uncle's antics could douse.

It had all been so fast that night, so dark and chaotic, that Laura hadn’t seen the face of the wolf that attacked her. It never even occurred to her that it might’ve been her uncle. All this time, they were running around town searching frantically for a fully functional alpha werewolf. Why would she suspect him?

Before Laura can ask, Derek’s snarl rips through the air. With one blow, the nurse hits the ground. Peter tuts at them.

“That’s not nice,” he tells Derek. “She’s my nurse.”

“She’s a psychotic bitch helping you kill people,” Derek throws back. Then, to Stiles, “Get out of the way.”

Stiles lets out a faint, “Oh, damn,” and scrambles to take up residence behind Derek’s broad back. Peter takes it all in with the detached interest of one watching a bug crawl across the pavement. It’s very different from the woods, feral and unhinged under the full moon’s light, and even more different from the uncle she remembers, shrewd and arrogant, yes, but not without warmth.

“You tried to kill me,” Laura says. “Your own niece. Your family.”

Peter’s cold eyes narrow. “Family,” he drawls, acid in his tone. “What sort of family leaves one of their own behind?”

“What else were we supposed to do?” The words get stuck on the lump in Laura’s throat, forcing their way past with a painful rasp. “The town was crawling with hunters waiting to finish what they started. If we’d stayed, we would’ve been—”

“And what about me?” Peter asked, head cocked. “Alone. Trapped. Defenseless.”

“Not a threat. You couldn’t hurt anyone the way you were,” Laura said, “and that meant that you were protected under the Code.”

Silkily, Peter said, “Yes, we all know how ironclad the precious Code is.”

Laura flushed, shame and grief welling up to choke her. “I didn’t know what else to do! I was eighteen and devastated and scared, and it wasn’t like I could take care of you myself. You needed more help than I could give you. This is where you were safest, Peter, and I wanted to keep you safe. But it wasn’t the safest place for us. We had to go.”

“So you went gallivanting off across the country. Meanwhile, here I was, locked inside the burned out husk of my failing body, slipping further and further from my sanity with every passing minute.” Peter’s smile is unnerving. “I was healing,” he says. “Cell by cell, I healed, until I hit a plateau. In the end, all I needed was a boost of power to finish the job.”

As they watch, the burns along his jaw begins to fade, waxy scar tissue receding to leave pale, unblemished new skin in its wake. A mere moment later, he is restored. If it wasn’t  for his long hair, he could have stepped right out of Laura’s memories from before the fire. As if none of it ever happened.

“The alpha power,” Derek says, his voice tight with emotion. “You tried to kill Laura so that you could heal yourself.”

Laura raises her head high, heart pounding. “But you couldn’t kill me. It wasn’t my power you stole.”

“No,” Peter allows, even as his eyes light up a bloody red. “You proved frustratingly difficult to dispatch. I had to find another to serve my purpose. Luckily, high school teachers don’t get a lot of martial training.”

It takes a few seconds for Laura to make the connection, but when she does, her heart drops. “Mrs. Finch?” The biology teacher’s body was found a ways into the trees behind the lacrosse fields several days ago. An animal attack, according to authorities, of course. “I knew she was a werewolf, but not an alpha.”

Peter looks disappointed. “Alphas can hide their presence, Laura,” he says. “You should know this. I’m sure Talia taught you how.”

Laura swallows down the wave of revulsion that comes with hearing her mother’s name in that disdainful tone. “You killed an innocent woman,” she says. “You murdered her to save yourself.”

“I was out of my mind,” Peter bites out. “You have no idea what it was like.”

“Were you out of your mind when you bit Scott?” Stiles pipes up from over Derek’s shoulder. Immediately, he seems to think better of drawing attention to himself. It’s too late, though. Peter eyes him with a bit of curiosity.

“You must be Stiles,” he says. “Would you rather it have been you, Stiles? It could’ve been, you know. One beta is as good as another to a new alpha in need of a pack.”

Derek growls, reaching behind to shove Stiles further down the hallway, like that will be enough to keep him safe if Peter decides to attack. “You won’t be getting any more.”

“Now, now, Derek. There’s no need to be hostile.”

“Says the man who nearly eviscerated me,” Laura grits out.

Her own eyes are glowing now, claws at the ready. Part of her still screams that this is her uncle, his scent still carrying the comforting notes of family and home, but every animal instinct she has rebels against him. She knows, on every level of her being, that the person before her is a threat. No amount of sentiment and wishful thinking can erase that.

The first flicker of uncertainty crosses Peter’s face. Not fear—Peter was never prone to fear, even before the fire—but a wariness that has him eyeing them both very carefully. He may be an alpha, and he may be healed now, but there’s no way that he isn’t still weak. A fight with a stronger, healthier alpha and her beta doesn’t have great odds, and he’s smart enough to know it.

“Let’s not be hasty,” he says, pasting on another smile. “It’s not as if we don’t have the same goal here.”

“Biting random teenagers and slaughtering innocent people?” Derek asks through a mouthful of fangs.

Peter’s smile disappears. “They weren’t innocent,” he says sharply. “Laura knows what they were guilty of. Don’t you?”

She thinks of the list she made when she started her investigation. All the people involved in the fire or its cover-up. A list she thought she lost, until the bodies started piling up, one after the other. Mountain lions with a very specific and coincidental taste for arsonists.

“What about the janitor, huh?” Stiles asks, apparently incapable of running away from danger like a reasonable person. “At the school. The one you tore into pieces and left under the bleachers in the gym. What was he guilty of, except for being in your way?”

“Stiles, get out of here,” Derek snaps at him.

“Yes, Stiles,” Peter echoes. “Run along home before you get yourself hurt.”

“He’s not going to be the one getting hurt here,” Laura says, a growl roughening her voice.

Between one heartbeat and the next, she gathers her strength and leaps. It’s too abrupt for Peter to dodge, but he twists just enough to deflect the force of her attack. He stumbles but doesn’t fall, and Laura skids past him, claws digging into the linoleum to drag herself to a halt.

Derek’s quick to follow suit. Peter is prepared this time, though, and Derek is flung back with a force that reduces the nurse’s station to a pile of splinters. Stiles stumbles back, out of the way of the cloud of debris, and then surges forward again to help drag Derek free of the wreckage. Peter bears down on them, a snarl on his lips.

Laura doesn’t let him reach them. With a snarl of her own, she goes for Peter’s legs, raking her claws across the backs of his ankles. She gets a howl of pain for her efforts and Peter staggers. He lashes out and catches Laura across the chest before her next attack can land. It knocks the wind from her, but it doesn’t stop her from coming. Her next hit draws blood along Peter’s side before a hard blow connects with the side of her head.

For a moment, she can’t see. The red in her vision is blood now, rather than rage, and the world spins. By the time things stabilize, the hallway before her is empty. Smears of red show Peter’s path to the door, which hangs on its hinges. The unconscious nurse is starting to stir.

Derek limps to Laura’s side. “Should we go after him?”

He’s clutching at his side like maybe a rib or two is broken. Stiles hovers at his shoulder, wide-eyed, hands outstretched like he’s waiting for Derek to collapse. Laura’s ripped shirt is soaked through with blood, though the scratches are starting to heal already. Derek’s injuries will take longer.

With a grimace, Laura lets herself collapse against the wall. “No,” she says. “We need to regroup. Rest. Figure out where to go from here.”

Derek nods with obvious relief. This time, when Stiles offers his shoulder for support, Derek lets himself take it.

“So…” Stiles points at the nurse. “What are we gonna do about her?”

Laura sighs. “Fuck if I know.”

Everything hurts, and not just physically. She feels scraped raw all the way down to her bones. Her mind is fuzzy now with the adrenaline rush of battle fading and she can’t hold a thought in her head long enough to process it.

Derek’s hand finds her shoulder and squeezes. “Hey,” he says softly. “We’ll figure it out, okay?”

It’s the vaguest kind of platitude, but it still makes warmth settle in Laura’s chest. She lays her hand over Derek’s, squeezing back, and musters up a smile for her little brother.

“Others like Allison?” Laura asked. Beside her, Derek snarled like the mere idea of Allison personally offended him, but Laura’s face was impassive, her tone neutral.

“Like Allison,” Scott said. “Like Stiles. Like my mom, and Stiles’ dad, and Dr. Deaton. Like you guys.”

Surprise broke through Laura’s poker face. “Like us?”

Scott shrugged, shifting on his feet. “Well, yeah. You’ve been shot at an awful lot in the last few weeks.”

“We’ve noticed,” Derek said flatly.

Scott ignored his tone, and Stiles bristling at it. “It just seems like you’ve got a lot of enemies. Like you could use all the help you can get.”

Laura surveyed him again, more carefully this time. “You know that if you took the bite, our enemies would become your enemies. All of those hunters? They’d be gunning for you too. Literally.”

It wasn’t a comfortable thought. Even without being a direct player, Scott had already seen more blood in the last week than he had in months of working at the vet clinic. Watching Laura dig the bullet out of Derek’s black-veined arm and force burning ash into the wound while he screamed ranked very highly on Scott’s list of most traumatic memories.

But even worse was the gnawing fear in his stomach of what would happen if Peter came after him again. Or if he went after Stiles next, or Allison. Sprinting through the woods with his lungs spasming and the thump of clawed feet at his back, racing death on two fronts and helpless against both of them, was so much worse than the threat of a few measly bullets that he would be better equipped to dodge or heal from anyway.

Scott looked Laura in the eye and said, “I know the risks. And I’m willing to take them.”

“Even if they lose you your girlfriend?” Derek asked, mouth twisting around the words like they were distasteful. “She’s an Argent, Scott. She would never be okay with—”

“You don’t know that,” Scott said through gritted teeth. “You don’t know her.”

“I know what happens a dumb kid thinks he knows something about ‘love’ and—”

Laura said Derek’s name. It was quiet, but firm, and enough to pull him up short mid-word. They shared a moment of eye contact, unspoken words being exchanged in a way that Scott was very familiar with; he and Stiles could have whole conversations without making a single noise. In the end, Derek shook his head sharply and walked away, letting the charred remainder of the Hale house’s front door slam behind him on the way out.

Laura let him go. “Don’t let him get to you,” she said. “He means well, I promise.”

“Funny way of showing it,” Stiles grumbled. “Asshole.”

A sharp growl reminded him that it was Laura’s little brother he was insulting. He had the good sense to look chastened, at least, though he didn’t take it back.

“Look,” Scott said, drawing her attention back to him. “I get why he’s worried. But I honestly don’t think Allison’s a threat. She’s not like her family, and not just because she doesn’t even know what it is they’re doing. You’ve been watching her, haven’t you? What do you think?”

Laura let out a long, slow breath. “I think...that she’s a sweet, normal-ish girl who has no idea what she’s caught up in. And I don’t think any of us knows how she’ll react to finding out. Not even her. Are you sure you want to risk putting yourself in her crosshairs if she goes the way of her aunt?”

“Don’t you think she might react more favorably if she finds out from us instead of from Kate?”

Laura cocked her head to the side in a gesture that Scott couldn’t help but recognize as very canine. He was pretty sure that Derek would teleport back into the house just to rip his head off if he said as much out loud, though, so he kept the observation to himself.

“You may have a point,” the alpha allowed. “And you sound like you’ve really thought this decision through.”

A tentative, hopeful smile tugged at Scott’s lips. “I have. I promise.”

Sharp blue eyes cut over to Stiles. “And what about you?”

Stiles looked over his shoulder. When there was no one back there that Laura could’ve been addressing instead, he said, “Who, me? Oh, hell no. This is all Scott. I am very much not interested in the whole chompy-bitey thing.” He mimed sinking his teeth into something. “I’m just here for moral support.”

Scott bumped their shoulders together, immensely grateful that Stiles was there, even if he did make a habit of antagonizing the already antagonistic brother of the alpha. Stiles bumped him back, grinning.

“Good,” Laura said, and she even sounded like she meant it, despite the very judgmental look on her face. “He’ll need it. The first month or two after the bite are...rough, to say the least.”

Stiles’ eyes widened with alarm. “How rough are we talking, exactly?”

Laura just smiled at him. Scott was a little surprised there were no actual fangs involved, but that wasn’t his biggest concern.

“Wait,” he said. “Does that mean you’ll do it? You’ll give me the bite?”

“You’re a good candidate for it,” Laura told him. “You’re young and strong. You’ll benefit more than most from it. You’re cognizant of the risks and have had time to process them and make your decision with a clear head. And you sound like you’re doing it for the right reasons.”

“So that’s a yes?” Stiles pressed.

“It’s a yes.”

Stiles let out a whoop of excitement. His air-punch almost knocked Scott upside the head, but Scott had years of practice with dodging his best friend’s wild gesticulations. He fought back a cheer of his own, a thrill running through him that was equal parts excitement and trepidation.

“So, like...now?” he asked.

“As good a time as any.” Laura tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear, looking a little nervous for the first time since Scott had met her. “I should probably warn you that I haven’t actually done this before. Not that it’s hard or anything!” she hastened to say. “It’s kind of hard to fuck up a bite. I just mean that… Well, it’s a big first for me. For any alpha.”

Scott offered her his warmest smile. “I’m sure you’ll do great. And, hey, it’ll be my first time getting bitten. So we can be bite-virgins together!”

The groan Stiles let out was long and loud, but it wasn’t enough to cover up the much more gratifying sound that was Laura’s snort of laughter.

“That was terrible,” she said. “I am already rethinking this decision.”

“No, you’re not.”

Laura smiled too, cheeks already wet with tears. “Mom? Is that really you?”

“It’s me, sweetheart.”

Talia’s voice echoed too, but differently. Like it was coming from far away, called out across the worlds of space between them. But it sounded like her, like Laura’s mom, and it was the sweetest sound Laura had heard in over a year.

Laura fell into Talia’s arms before she could question if she would find anything solid to hold onto. Luck was on her side for once, or fate or magic or whatever was allowing her this moment. Her mother hugged her tightly and the only thing that wasn’t perfect about the embrace was that there was no scent.

Talia had always smelled of earth and peppermint. This, here, smelled like nothing at all.

The hug lasted for a second and an age. Then Talia was pulling away, hands coming up to cup Laura’s face instead. Her thumbs rubbed away the wetness she found there.

“It’s so good to see you,” she said. “But, Laura, why have you done this? This isn’t where you belong.”

Laura wrapped her fingers around her mother’s wrist. “I know, but I just— I had to see you. Talk to you.”

“About what?”

A lump rose in Laura’s throat, thick and unmoving. It was as familiar as her surroundings were alien; it had been months since she’d been able to breathe without feeling like she was choking, to speak without swallowed tears clogging the way. She couldn’t keep the tears back this time, not when it was her mom that she was facing and not the hollow, shell-shocked little brother that needed her to be strong.

She was so tired of being the strong one.

“I don’t know what to do.” The words scraped her throat on their way out, torn out of her by the desperation of months spent watching the light in Derek’s eyes fade away, no matter what she did to hold onto it. “I’m trying, mom, but nothing I do is good enough. I’m trying to do what you taught me to—to be what you taught me to be—but I’m no alpha. Not like you.”

The spark sat heavy in her chest, burning hot like an ember, and Laura hated it. It wasn’t hers. It wasn’t supposed to be hers for years and years, not until she was grown and her mother chose to pass it on to her, once all of her training was complete. It wasn’t supposed to have roared to life one random autumn evening when she’d barely even begun to understand what an alpha was meant to be. She’d only just been allowed to stand witness to an alpha conclave, for god’s sake, and that was just for observation.

None of this was supposed to have happened. But the eyes that met Laura’s were brown and cool instead of flaming red and there was no beat of a heart in Talia’s chest. Her mother wasn’t the alpha any longer and it was all on Laura now. The pack—the pitiful, tattered remnants of it—was her responsibility and she was failing.

Laura’s knees buckled. Talia followed her down with all the grace she’d ever shown in life and Laura buried her face in the soft fur of her mother’s shoulder. “I’m not ready to do this on my own,” she said. “I’m losing him, mom, and I don’t know how to help him. I can barely even help myself.”

Talia shushed her. “My girl, you’re doing everything you can. That’s all anyone can ask of you.”

Warm, gentle hands carded through Laura’s hair and she leaned into the touch. She’d missed it more than she had realized. Or just more than she’d been willing to admit to herself when she knew there was no chance of ever having it back.

“Tell me, Laura,” Talia said. “What must an alpha be?”

The question was achingly familiar. Hours and hours spent in the woods behind their house, in the tunnels underneath it, in the living room curled up by the fireplace while her siblings were out playing, listening to her mother’s teachings and trying to take them to heart.

“An alpha must be firm,” Laura recited. “And an alpha must bend. An alpha must care for her pack above all else, and she must guide them with the wisdom of her ancestor.”

Wisdom that she should’ve had years more to learn. Wisdom that was all but lost to her now, burned to ash and blown away like everything else. Even if Laura could have brought herself to ask for more lessons right now, to beg her mother to spill out every scrap of knowledge she had ever gotten from her own mother, the vision would only last for so long. The druid hadn’t been able to tell her how long, only that it would end. Only that it could not be repeated.

This was all the time she had and it wasn’t enough.

Her mother just pet her hair again, unconcerned. “That’s right.”

Laura squeezed her eyes shut against the throb in her chest; that warm, approving tone sank into the hollowness in her bones until she felt she might burst with it. All she’d ever wanted was to make her mother proud, but answering a question correctly wasn’t enough. She didn’t deserve her mother’s pride now and it hurt.

Talia shushed her. “Sweetheart, do you care for your pack?”

“Of course I do,” Laura told her. “More than anything.”

“Have you led your pack as best you know how?”

Laura sobbed. “I’ve tried, but I—”

“Have you kept your pack safe?”

They didn’t feel safe. Nowhere had felt safe from the moment they felt the pack bonds ripped away from them, no matter how far they ran or how well they hid. But it had been a year and they were still here, Laura and Derek, Peter under the care of people who actually knew what to do with him. Peter was a burned out husk of the man he had been, and Derek was hardly any better, but they were still alive. That had to count for something, didn’t it?

“You’ve done well, Laura,” Talia told her. “As well as anyone could expect. But there’s one teaching you’ve forgotten.”

Laura pulled back to look up at her.

Talia placed a warm hand on her cheek. “My girl, there is only so far you can bend before you break.” She smiled. “And sometimes you have to.”

“No,” Laura said at once. “No, I can’t fall apart. Derek needs me. I have to be strong for him. I’m all he has left.”

“Sweetheart, you can only be strong for so long,” Talia went on, undeterred. “But a broken bone heals stronger.”

Frowning, Laura shook her head. “I don’t understand.”

“You will.”

Talia pressed a kiss to Laura’s forehead, like she’d always done when any of her kids were upset, and pulled her close again. Laura collapsed into her without protest. She should ask more questions, she thought, if this was going to be the last she would ever see of her alpha, but she couldn’t bring herself to do it. She didn’t think she’d get any more answers anyway; she was too familiar with her mother’s silences.

Time passed or it didn’t. Laura soaked up the warmth of the embrace, letting her memories fill in the gaps where scent and heartbeat should’ve been, and tried not to hate herself for how much she didn’t want to leave. She had a brother to get back to, and all she wanted was to stay here where there were no responsibilities, no one depending on her, no empty legacy to uphold.

Out there, everything hurt. It built up and built up until she feared the bursting dam would wash away all that was left of her and take her baby brother with it. In here, with her mother’s arms around her, it felt different. Like maybe, if she exploded, the shards wouldn’t slice open anyone but herself.

She cried until she ran out of tears, and for once she didn’t have to worry if Derek would see or hear or smell them. They soaked the fur of Talia’s coat and left salt on Laura’s lips.

Allison shoots her a look like she’s reconsidering her choice to let Laura stay. She can’t maintain it, though. Her usual laser focus is gone, replaced by impotent rage, hands grasping at air and eyes skittering restlessly along the dull stone walls. The shift hasn’t taken her, and yet she looks every bit the caged animal.

Laura knows better than to say so. She pushes off the wall and approaches the rusty bars, familiar from those handful of years as an adolescent when hormones had wreaked havoc on her control like it does for all teenage werewolves. Puberty is a bitch like that. She wraps a hand around one of them and Allison pulls back as far as she can manage.

“You shouldn’t be down here,” Allison says. “It’s not safe.”

“I’m an alpha,” Laura reminds her. “I think I can handle one newly shifted beta. I’ve made it through five so far. And those didn’t even have the benefit of a very sturdy cell.”

“Not sturdy enough.”

Laura frowns. “Ally, it’s going to be fine. Trust me, this thing has held up through decades of full moons. No werewolf has broken out of it so far, and you won’t either.”

Allison shakes her head. Fear blooms in her scent, bitter and harsh, and Laura doesn’t understand. She reaches through the bars and tries not to be hurt when Allison flinches away from it. They’ve been growing closer lately, yes, but just because they’ve been moving toward being something doesn’t mean anything in the face of what Allison is going through. This isn’t the time for ego or hurt feelings. Laura just wants to be here for someone she cares about.

“You were there for Isaac’s transition,” she says. “And Erica’s, and Boyd’s. There were some rough patches, but you saw them all come out the other side just fine. Even Scott made it through his messy bite. And I didn’t let any of them hurt anyone, did I?”

Laura keeps her voice low and steady, trying to exude the sort of calming, reassuring energy that her mother always had. It doesn’t seem to be working very well; Allison isn’t relaxing a bit. Her jaw is clenched so tight Laura’s surprised she hasn’t cracked a tooth yet, fists white-knuckled and shoulders taut as her bowstring. Her eyes are wide and glassy, though she’s stubborn enough not to let any tears fall.

Her voice is choked with them anyway when she says, “But what if I’m not like them?”

Laura grips the cell bars again because the alternative is breaking the lock off the door and pulling Allison into her arms, danger be damned. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Allison smiles and it’s the bleakest expression Laura’s ever seen on her face.

“I’m not like Scott,” she says with a weak shrug. “I mean, nobody’s like Scott, but I’m— You know how I am, Laura. What I’m capable of. Where I come from.”

Laura shakes her head. “What does that have to do with anything?”

But Allison isn’t listening to her. She’s scrubbing her hands over her face, fingers sliding up to tangle in her hair. Her breath comes faster, sharp on the inhale and stuttering back out.

“I’m not like them, Laura, I’m like—” Allison lets out a bark of laughter, dancing on the edge of hysteria, and throws out her arms. “Maybe mom had the right idea!”

The bars creak under the sudden pressure of Laura’s fingers. “Allison, don’t even joke about that.”

“Who’s joking? Jesus, Laura, you saw what Kate turned into!”

The cell has withstood generations of moon-crazed werewolves, but it doesn’t withstand Laura. With one swift yank, she tears the padlock from its mooring and tosses it aside. She’s inside before Allison can protest—not that that stops Allison from trying—and ignores the panicked flail of Allison’s hands to step in close.

It’s instinct for Laura to grip the nape of Allison’s neck, just firmly enough to hold her in place. All at once, Allison stops fighting to push her away. It’s not a restful stillness, more like prey in a predator’s sights, frozen and quivering. A beta awaiting her alpha’s judgment.

“What I saw back then,” Laura says, slow and deliberate, “was a monster. Before and after the scratch that turned her. But Allison, you’re not Kate.”

Up this close, the scent of fear overpowers everything. It’s seeping from every pore, clinging to Allison’s skin like the wetness that clings to her eyelashes. Allison’s fingers latch onto Laura’s arms and dig in, hard enough to leave bruises that will fade before she lets go.

“I could be.” Her voice cracks. “I wanted to be, as a kid. I wanted so badly to be like her. And I was, Laura, you know I was. I let her and Gerard get into my head and then I was just like her, and it would be so easy for me to—”

Laura cuts her off before she can say anything else patently stupid. “That’s not going to happen, Ally. I know it isn’t. Do you know why?” She squeezes Allison’s neck until brown eyes meet hers. “Because the shape we take reflects the person that we are.”

Allison’s lip quivers, but she doesn’t blink. “That’s what I’m afraid of.”

“Then, Ally—” Laura smiles. “—you don’t know yourself like I know you.”

The cell has no windows, but it doesn’t keep out the full force of the rising moon. Its power creeps up on them like the zing of static electricity, the weight of atmospheric pressure. It’s a feeling Laura knows as well as her own heartbeat, almost familiar enough to be comforting in its enormity. 

She sees it the moment that feeling hits Allison in full. It’s a gasp and a full-body jolt. It’s bracing for impact. It’s newly claw-tipped fingers digging deeper into Laura’s shoulders like Laura is the only steady thing in a world knocked off its axis.

Laura holds her through it. There’s no screaming and blood, no burst of uncontrollable rage, no ripple of blue spotted nagual fur. In the end, there’s only brown eyes turned luminescent gold. Laura’s own flash red in answer and a new thread settles in her chest, warm and strong alongside all the other pack bonds she harbors there.

This time, Allison doesn’t protest when Laura shifts closer. She leans into Laura’s cool hands against her cheeks, glowing eyes fluttering closed, and sighs at the kiss Laura presses to her forehead. The fear is beginning to dissipate from her scent now, replaced bit by bit with the sweetness of relief.

“See?” Laura whispers between them. “I knew it.”

Derek was still bleeding when they made it back to the motel. It wasn’t wolfsbane at least, so small mercies. The bullet was just lodged in his side, shifting around with every movement and preventing the wound from closing. He bit down on his own arm as Laura dug it out with her claws, sinking fangs deep into the muscle to keep from screaming and alerting the motel’s management.

Blood was so red. Laura had seen plenty of blood in her lifetime, far more than she wished she had, but she’d had no idea that it looked like this: darker the deeper into the abdominal cavity it was, brighter in the light, turning brown at the edges as it dried. So many different shades of one color, so much more variation than the dull spectrum of greys.

“Are you okay?”

Laura’s head snapped up to see Derek watching her, eyebrows furrowed in concern. She must have been distracted for longer than she’d realized. Derek was still laid out on the bed, panting as his side slowly knitted together. Laura hurriedly pulled the scratchy comforter up from the end of the bed, heedless of how bloody her hands were considering the mess they’d already made, and tucked it in around him. He rolled his eyes but didn’t protest.

“Hey,” he said instead. “You sure there’s nothing wrong? Did you hit your head or something? You look a little out of it.”

“I’m fine, cub,” she said. “Totally fine. You just get some sleep.”

He looked far from convinced. Not that that was surprising; they knew each other too well. They’d been living in each other’s pockets for years by now, watching each other’s backs, keeping each other safe, clinging to each other harder than was probably healthy, but no one could really begrudge them that. Normally Laura was grateful for how easily Derek could read her. It meant that she didn’t have to explain her thoughts, that he knew when she needed support and when she needed space, that one look was enough to communicate an entire conversation’s worth of words.

Unfortunately, now it meant that he saw everywhere her eyes lingered, arrested by every flash of color she had never seen before.

She almost told him. He knew something was up, that much was obvious, and it wasn’t like it was Laura’s fault or anything. She wouldn’t be confessing to some crime or sin. It happened all the time and no one had control over it. But how could she admit that she’d gotten her colors during a fight for her life? How could she tell him that her soulmate was a hunter?

“Laura—” Derek started to say, but he cut himself off with a sigh. One more long look, weary and resigned in a way someone so young should never have cause to be, and he said, “You get some rest too, okay?”

“Of course, baby bro.”

She smoothed his hair back off his forehead with the cleaner of her hands and he leaned into the soft touch. Then he caught her hand in his and gave it a squeeze. After a quick stop in the questionably sanitary bathroom to rinse off, Laura laid herself out on the other small bed. One last whispered goodnight to her brother and she clicked off the lamp even though it was barely 8pm, but she knew better than to think she would sleep.

Nighttime was comfortingly familiar. The darkness dulled everything until she could almost pretend she hadn’t gotten her colors at all. But then a car would drive past outside the window and splash everything with gold—beige wallpaper, green landscape painting, brown carpet, blue duvet—and she couldn’t help but chase after that.

Colors were beautiful. Not that she hadn’t found beauty in the world before, but greyscale was nothing compared to the rainbow. There was a reason getting your colors was supposed to be a joyous occasion, something to celebrate and luxuriate in. Something wonderful to share with your soulmate and experience together.

That wouldn’t happen with Laura. For one, she didn’t even know who her soulmate was.

Well, that wasn’t entirely true. Laura knew that she was either an Argent or one of their lackeys. She was a hunter, an enemy. Laura didn’t even know why she was surprised because this was just her luck. She had spent her entire childhood dreaming about finding her soulmate, and it turned out to be yet another big cosmic joke. Maybe it was karma. Maybe she was supposed to have died in the flames with everyone else and this was the universe’s way of getting back at her for dodging that bullet.

She listened to Derek’s breathing, slow and even, no hitch of pain; his wound had finished healing then. That should’ve been enough for Laura to relax, to let go of the fear that had her every muscle clenched tight, but it was never enough. What did it matter that they could heal when they would just keep being hurt? How long would it be before she lost him too?

There was a gentle thump of footsteps from outside. Normally that wouldn’t have been cause for alarm, but these ones stopped directly in front of their door instead of moving on down the line. With another glance at the lump of her sleeping brother, Laura slid out of bed. She could hear a heartbeat through the wood, just one, quick but steady. Whoever it was, they didn’t knock.

Cautiously, Laura raised herself up to the peephole.

There was purple. And she’d only ever seen purple once before.

She yanked open the door so fast the hinges almost gave out and closed it just as quickly behind her, only not slamming it in the hopes that Derek would sleep through this. The woman in front of her took a step back, but she didn’t jump or stumble. Her heart rate barely spiked at all, even when Laura bared sharp teeth in a snarl. She just raised her hands in front of her, palms out.

“I’m not here to hurt you,” she said lowly.

“Bullshit,” Laura growled. “You were plenty up for hurting us earlier.”

“That was—” The woman’s jaw clenched, lips pressed into a thin line. Her wide eyes darted across Laura’s face, examining her. “—before.”

“You shouldn’t have come here, hunter,” Laura said, staunchly ignoring the complicated punch in the gut it was to have confirmation that this was her soulmate, to see this woman staring at her so wonderingly. It wasn’t her  the hunter was awestruck by, it was just the colors.

Brown eyes met hers, sharp and narrowed now. “My name,” the woman said, “is Allison.”

This time the growl was completely involuntary, forced out of Laura by instinct alone.

“Argent,” she said, slurring around the fangs that itched to sink into flesh and tear. Of all the people she could’ve had for a soulmate, it had to be the fucking Argent princess, the scion of the most dangerous hunting family in the country.

Allison stepped back again, but only a bit, hands coming up higher in their placating gesture.

“I told you I’m not here to fight,” she said again.

“Then why are you here?” Laura demanded.

“I got my colors,” Allison said boldly, head high. “I know you did too. That makes you my—”

Laura had to laugh. “Oh please! As if that changes anything. It doesn’t make me not a werewolf. And it doesn’t make you not a murderer.”

That got Allison heart rate up. Her hands came down to her sides, balling into fists, and her pretty face collapsed into an ugly scowl. She bit out, “I’ve never killed anyone who didn’t deserve it.”

“And we all deserve it, right?” Laura asked. “We’re monsters. We’re dangerous by nature. Safer to just put us down now before we inevitably lose control.”

“You do all lose control,” Allison shot back. “Eventually.”

“Oh sweetheart, you have no idea how much self-control I’m showing by not tearing your throat out here and now,” Laura said. “No one on the planet has better control of themselves than an alpha werewolf.”

“Tell that to the one that killed my mother,” Allison sneered. “And the one that killed my aunt. Werewolves killed half my family.”

Laura’s eyes flared red before she could stop them. She was up in Allison’s face in the space of one heartbeat to the next, teeth bared as she said, “And hunters killed all of mine!”

Allison stood her ground, but only just, the sourness of fear on her skin even as she stood toe to toe with Laura. There was a flush to her cheeks, rosy pink on porcelain, but that was nothing compared to the scent of gunpowder and steel that surrounded her. Every deep breath Laura took to calm herself only filled her lungs with more of that scent, an aura of lethality that she knew would follow Allison no matter where she went, too deeply embedded to escape.

“In there,” Laura said, her voice low and steady even as the finger she pointed behind her shook, “is my little brother. The only person I have left in this world. And I’ll be damned if I put him in danger for the likes of you. Joke of a soulmate or not.”

Allison’s eyes flicked over Laura’s shoulder to the motel room door, just for a second before returning to her, and that was all it took to make up Laura’s mind.

“Get out of here, hunter,” she said with all the force of her alpha spark behind it. “And don’t come back.”

She didn’t give Allison a chance to respond before she was closing the door in her face.

Laura waited, breath held, until she heard the clip of Allison’s footsteps fade. Then she let her forehead collide with the door with a thump, suddenly too exhausted to hold her head up anymore. It felt like every part of her was trembling and ready to collapse and she sort of wanted to cry but there was no way she was going to let that happen. She would not cry over a hunter she didn’t even know.

A rustle of fabric startled her. She spun around to find Derek sitting up in his bed, shoulders hunched and eyes on the bedspread in front of him. Slowly, he looked up at her, and Laura’s held breath escaped her in a heavy sigh.

“How much of that did you hear?” she asked without much hope.

“Why did you let her go?”

Laura frowned. “I didn’t want her here,” she said. “I don’t want her here.”

“She’s your soulmate,” Derek said.

“She’s a hunter,” Laura reminded him. “And we all know what happens when we make the mistake of trusting hunters.”

Derek flinched back like he’d been hit. Part of Laura felt bad for bringing that up, for waving it in his face when she knew how much the guilt ate away at him, but the rest of her thought it was pretty warranted. The fact remained that getting romantically invested in a hunter—an Argent—was what had gotten everyone they loved slaughtered. They had to have learned that lesson by now.

But Derek didn’t stay hunched in on himself for long. Instead he shoved the covers back and stood to face her, though it took him an extra second or two to look her in the eye.

“It’s not the same,” he said. “She wasn’t— Kate wasn’t my soulmate. She was just—”

“She was playing you,” Laura snapped. “And it was easy, Derek, because you were young and sweet and trusting. But we don’t have the luxury of being that naive again.”

Derek clenched his jaw, his scent spiking with pain and grief, but he didn’t back down.

“It’s not naive to trust your soulmate,” he insisted. “You got your colors, Laura! You can’t fake that. There’s no way it could be a trick or manipulation. Don’t you see? This is different.”

“Not different enough.”

Laura turned her head away so she didn’t have to see the way his face shut down. She wished she could turn off her other senses too, block out the smell of his frustration, the heaviness of his breathing. But she could only sit down on the shitty motel bed with her back to him, digging her fingers into the plasticky duvet, and pray that this was one of the times he would give her space.

It was a long time before he moved, unending seconds filled with nothing but heartbeats and unspoken words. The blankets on the other bed rustled as he sank down on them, but Laura didn’t move.

Finally, so quietly Laura would’ve missed it if she were human, Derek said, “You can’t just let this slip through your fingers.”

The sting of tears in her eyes caught Laura by surprise. She squeezed her eyes shut tight to keep them from falling.

“We leave first thing in the morning,” she said, as firmly as she could manage when it felt like she had no air in her lungs. “We keep heading west.”

She laid down and pulled the covers up over her head, but she never heard Derek do the same.