Chapter 57
Lydia screamed.
High pitched and wailing and Stiles almost drove the jeep off the road. The three werewolves in the car slammed their hands over their ears, clearly in pain, but the scream went on and on and on.
When it finally stopped, the silence was deafening.
"They're burning." Lydia whispered. Her eyes were wide and unseeing, gaze turned towards where the orange glow of a large fire colored the sky.
Stiles just nodded and put his foot down. He had been to young to remember much of the Hale Fire but if you grew up in Beacon Hills, especially as the nosy son of the sheriff, you knew about it. Stiles had seen pictures of the burned down house.
Derek can't go through this again, was echoing through his mind. But the house was burning, there was no doubt about that.
"I need to call Derek." Stiles snatched Isaac's phone. They needed Derek here as fast as possible. They needed an alpha. He didn't have much time to explain because he was still speeding down the road but it was enough to tell Derek where he was needed.
Stiles took the last turn and brought the jeep to a halt. The car hadn't fully stopped but the werewolves were already out and running towards the farm house. Stiles and Lydia followed as quickly as humanly possible.
The doors were blocked and there was mountain ash, too. Stiles ran for the ash.
Everything after that was a blur of fire and smoke.
For a moment Stiles thought they were too late, that history had repeated itself and the whole pack had burned to death in their own house. But then a figure stumbled out, clutching two small bodies to his chest. The old man with Gina and Jeremy, Stiles realized when he grabbed the man's arm and led him to safety.
Then all hell broke lose. Out of nowhere came firetrucks and police cars and a paramedic insisted to at least have a look at Stiles' hands. He tried to protest that they should take care of the others first but there were more ambulances, one was already driving off with the lights flashing, and Stiles realized that they were already taking care of the others. He saw Megan sitting in the back of one of the ambulance cars with the twins wedged to her sides and Gina in her lap. With all the dirt and grime all over them Stiles wasn't sure but he thought that there was a small bundle of fur in her lap as well. Ellen stood next to them, a screaming but uninjured baby Stacy in her arms. The kids had made it out alive. Their eyes were too big and they looked haunted but they were alive.
Stiles did let the man take care of his hands, now he noticed how raw and blistered they were, but he refused a trip to the hospital.
There were still some pack members missing.
With Laura's death all the bonds had vanished. From one second to the next the whole pack had become a bunch of omegas. So Stephen couldn't tell, if the missing pack members were still alive. He still stood as close to the still smoldering ruin of the house as the firefighters would let him in hope to hear a heart-beat indicating that somebody was still alive in there.
Stiles doubted he could hear his own heart-beat over the firefighters, the sound of the water and the cracking of wood but he let him be.
They were carrying out bodies now.
"This one's alive." Somebody yelled and immediately everybody went into action. Stiles got a short glimpse on the thing they pulled out of the house. It was black and charred beyond recognition. Stiles was pretty sure there was fabric melted into the raw flesh but he averted his eyes before he could get a better look.
"That's Mark." Ellen said. Stiles had no idea how she could tell.
She was rocking Stacy in her arms but the screaming had calmed down to hiccups. Stiles hoped she would fall asleep soon. The ambulance with Megan and the other kids had taken off a minute ago.
"Why didn't you ride with your children?" Stiles wondered. Her husband was still missing but the twins were on their way to the hospital.
"There wasn't enough room." She said. "I was about to follow the ambulance but ..." She gestured towards the side where some of the pack's cars were parked. They were covered with ash and littered with little bits of debris.
"Isaac will drive you." Stiles decided. Ellen was in no condition to drive. She was holding it together for now but driving was out of question.
"Take the jeep." Stiles handed the keys to Isaac and to Ellen he said: "I'll inform you if …" He couldn't bring himself to end the sentence.
He watched them leave and then he went to find out more about Mark's condition. Just like with Loreen earlier they couldn't tell him much but the look on their faces told him more than enough.
Stepping to the side, where it was a little less hectic, Stiles called Derek to update him and to send him towards the hospital. As much as Stiles wanted Derek right at his side, he was needed there more than here.
With that out of the way and nothing else to do, he returned to Lydia who still stood where he had left her.
"Derek is on his way." He said. "How are you holding up?"
"I'm fine." She said too quickly and in a too high voice. Maybe to distract herself from the death and destruction all around her, she turned to have a look at Stiles.
"You know." She tilted her head in a way that was so Lydia he couldn't help but give her a watery smile. "When I heard that …" She paused and started anew. "Jackson was bragging about how they beat you up and how Peter wanted to claim you. When I heard that Derek did it instead, I thought that I would never see you again. I thought …"
Stiles knew exactly what she had thought. He had thought the same but being part of Peter's pack she had a front row seat to how he treated his claimed humans.
"Believe me, Peter is a real bad role model." Stiles said grimly.
"I get that but I saw you with Isaac, I saw you taking the lead here." She gestured over to the house where Stephan was still standing alone by himself.
I should check on him in a moment, Stiles decided.
"They don't treat you like a claimed human." She continued. "And you don't act like one either."
Her gaze was fixed on him as if he was a puzzle she intended to solve.
"First of all, claimed humans have the same status as the other pack members, humans and werewolves, they're just bonded more tightly to the alpha." Stiles understood that now. A pack member was a pack member no matter how they had ended up in the pack. And for sure it didn't matter if you were human or wolf.
She raised her eyebrow at him, clearly not believing a word he was saying.
"And second." He let out a sigh. "I have a different status in the pack now. I'm the alpha's mate."
"You're what?" Her voice climbed an octave while she tried to hiss at him. "That's what he's telling you? Stiles, you should know better than anyone, you can't trust them."
If that's true, why are you even here?, Stiles wondered but didn't asked the question.
"Jackson likes to pretend that we're mates. But we're not. And even when Peter …" She looked away. "There is no such thing as mates. It's all just bullshit to keep us on a tight leash."
Perking up Stiles had a closer look at her. She was hugging herself as if she would fall apart if she didn't physically pulled herself together and she was avoiding his eyes.
"Lydia?" He ducked his head to have a look at her face. "What did Peter do?"
For a long moment it looked as if she wouldn't answer.
"He tried to make me his mate." She finally said. "He tried to claim me and he tried to bite me. Nothing worked."
Stiles sucked in a breath. That was what had happened when she had been wandering around the woods naked. Stiles didn't know why nothing of that had worked, and he really didn't want to think about Peter trying to claim Lydia, that was something to think about later. Now he just stepped closer and drew her into a hug.
After a second she sagged more into him and then the tears started to fall.
"You got out." He said into her hair. She had risked everything to help them and it was only thanks to her that they had made it here in time to at least save the children. "You're safe with us. I won't let anything happen to you."
He had wanted Peter dead before but now he wanted to rip out his organs one by one and fill up the cavity with wolfsbane. Then he would sew his stomach back together with mistletoe and a big ass needle made of mountain ash. He would cut off his dick and made Peter eat it, just for good measure. And then he would sit back and watch him slowly die.
They stood like that until Stephen finally gave up his position at the house and came back to them.
"Where are the others?" He asked while Stiles and Lydia let go of each other. She wiped the tears off with the back of her hand which only smeared the grime on her face.
"At the hospital." Stiles answered but then he got distracted by a faint blip in the back of his mind. For too long there had only been the bright beacon of Isaac in his head and way too many loose ends but now one of the ends had connected again.
"Derek's coming." He said with a nod.
"Is he coming here?" The way Stephen perked up at the mention of the alpha was all wolf and it showed just how much the other man was caving an alpha. The whole pack did, especially after so many casualties. Which sounded way too clinical for the death of half a pack.
"I told him to go to the hospital." That was where Stiles wanted to be as well, with Derek and Isaac.
One of the officers offered them a ride to the hospital, he wanted to check in with the other pack members anyway and maybe get a statement from them. He didn't say the last part but Stiles knew how this worked. Get the statement as early as possible, while the memory is still fresh. He knew how it worked but he didn't have to like it when the victims were his pack members. Laura's pack wasn't technically his but Derek had been part of that pack before and Stiles had a feeling that most of them would join Derek rather sooner than later.
That thought was confirmed a minute later when suddenly a new connection formed in the back of Stiles' mind. Derek had accepted a new beta. Most likely Ellen, she would need an alpha the most to keep it together for her children. If it was her, Becky would follow soon.
Miranda was still missing so she couldn't decide for Jeremy. And if Stacy was a werewolf or not Stiles still didn't know but he guessed that he would find out soon.
When they arrived at the hospital two more bonds flickered up in Stiles' mind but they were weak, barely there, and they felt different than the bond to one of the betas. They felt like they were about to slip back into nothingness any second now. Stiles didn't know what to make out of those.
"I have to see Megan." Stephen didn't look back when he hurried off to find his daughter.
Lydia followed Stiles when he went to search for his mate.
Chapter 58 Masterpost