Chapter 3: Peaceful times come at a price.

Dereks POV

Derek's day had been, hands down, horrible. After rushing home from basketball training and quickly and admittedly half-heartedly through his homework, he had the grocery trip discussion. He had to seriously work on his parents to convince them, that he could manage a last-minute trip to the grocery store, and still get back for dinner. Pack dinners were a big deal in his family and rarely missed, if at all.

Which lost him another ten minutes, he could have maybe spent with Kate. Even if she wouldn't let him touch her or talk to her directly. She did it because she didn't want to risk what they had. He knew. It felt wrong to keep this from his alpha either way. Even if the thought of sneaking around and having something to hide made him feel smug. The girls at school were nowhere near as interesting as Kate. She was so hot and nice and actually interested in him and what he was talking about. He always felt this distance with everybody else. He knew it stemmed from the fact, that he had to hide what he and his family were. On the other hand, having a secret, he could share with someone outside of his family felt liberating. Like it somehow isolated him less.

The moment he stepped into the grocery store he noticed him. The guy looked absolutely out of place next to the fresh produce. He had light brown hair, pale skin that was scattered in freckles, a cheeky grin on his face and looked just ridiculously hot. He had known he was bisexual for some time now, but he'd never felt this attracted to a stranger before. All of his senses agreed, that yes, he'd tap that. He followed him to the pasta isle, which was coincidently the isle he and Kate used to exchange their little notes. She agreed that she'd give him a number, he could use to contact her with, soon.

Right now, he was at a loss. The guy stared at the pasta section, like it was a mystery waiting to be solved. After the guy had crouched down, his shirt that had already been pulled taut over his muscles, had risen a little and granted him glimpse of grey geometric lines and patterns. Tattoos. By the looks of it a lot. However, before he could contemplate further what he had seen, he was pulled out of his stupor, by mystery guy asking, "Do you need anything?"

Holy shit. This was weird. He'd stared at the guys hip for like a minute. This was embarrassing, he couldn't leave, Kate's note was still there, and she had told him before that she didn't like him taking too long to collect them. He finally managed to regain his composure and answered, "I'm waiting for someone."

The dude just cocked an eyebrow. God he was cool. "In the pasta isle?"

"Yes."

Now he seemed kind of stressed, "Yes well, I'm sorry if I'm interrupting your drug deal. But I'm having a pasta emergency."

"My what?!" Was this guy serious? Never mind his inability to actually get anything out of drugs, he didn't look shady. Not in the least.

"Dude seriously. You can stare all you want, I'm not finished with the contemplation of which pasta to use." They guy now looked kind of pissed actually. At least he hadn't caught him checking him out. "What are you even – ". "I used to think Fusilli all the way but what if I missed out because of that. There are so many possibilities to choose from… Can't go wrong with classic Spaghetti, neither, but what about Penne or Rigatoni, am I right?"

The guy steamrolled the fuck over him and before he could even articulate something akin to "I don't know." A smug looking redhead came up next to him, brandishing a Tequila bottle in one hand and a net of limes in the other, while she exclaimed "Guess who's going to get hammered tonight."

He felt an irrational stab of jealousy when the other men replied, "I sure hope you mean me.", with a suggestive wink. The feeling dissipated quickly when he continued without missing a beat "Lyds, I'm kind of stuck here, I just can't decide which Pasta to choose, I feel so pressured, knowing that my indecisiveness is stalling the drug overlord of Beacon Hills from exchanging the goods."

That kicked Derek, who had looked wide eyed from Stiles, who was sporting a shit-eating grin to an amused Lydia, into action. What the fuck was wrong with these people? A Drug-Overlord? Him? What even. "I already told you that I'm not here for drugs. I was just – ". That was when his phone rung, and he saw that the caller ID was his mom. Shit. He'd missed his opportunity and the guy he'd ogled shamelessly had a beautiful girlfriend. Double shit.

He hurried out of the store, thinking about their interaction, which was why he forgot to buy anything. Needless to say, that got him into even more trouble.

That night he came up with a plan. He would tag along tomorrow, on the weekly grocery shop and quickly grab the note. Kate's perfume always guaranteed, that he found the notes fairly quickly.

It was a good plan. She'd never know that he hadn't managed to grab the note this evening. He slept peacefully, knowing that tomorrow would be better.

On the other side of town, Stiles and Lydia were on their way to the Hale House. They both steeled themselves, feeling nervous about the meeting. Lydia chose a beautiful summer dress with a floral print that hugged her body in all the right places. She'd also braided her hair in a way, that looked entirely too complicated, she had kept her make-up natural. She looked well put together, and incredibly confident.

He had gotten into a pair of black skinny jeans and a black vintage band shirt. The soft fabric clung to his muscled physique, the soft black hoodie completed the outfit. It put emphasize on his broad shoulders and most importantly hid all his tattoos. He didn't want to risk needing a spell and then not being able to use it, so he decided to deactivate the rune, that usually hid the ones he wanted to hide. He felt incredibly comfortable in his outfit, which had probably been Lydia's intention. They were after all portraying themselves as a young couple, that wanted to introduce themselves in a casual manner. Not make some kind of business proposal. He had been a little afraid Lydia would demand he put on a suit or some shit like that.

They both had no idea how this was going to work. Every formal pack meeting they ever had, followed the same pattern. Stiles stood by his dad, Chris and Lydia. Derek stood in the middle of the room, Deaton slightly behind him to his left, Scott and Cora between Derek and Stiles to his right and Jackson and Peter stood firmly between whoever requested the pack meeting and the only exit. They always had Isaac and Liam guarded with a notice-me-not spell in the dark corner by the windows as a back-up and positioned Kira by the power control on the far side of the room directly behind Derek. The strategy behind it was simple and it worked like a dream. What it wasn't was traditional. Traditionally the second had to stand next to the Alpha and the humans were ushered into a far-off corner behind the two, while everyone else flanked the newcomers, or something like that. At least that's what that one alpha once said, as he laughed in Derek's face. He didn't laugh for long though, courtesy of Jackson.

Deaton had only given them one useful tip: Only defer to the alpha. They wouldn't have a hard time with that because they pretty much never deferred to anyone in their little ragtag pack. Scott, true alpha or not, couldn't be bothered to give a shit about that kind of stuff and Derek, who was their acting alpha, would rather not pull rank on his own. He considered the bitten werewolves and the few humans family. He only ever did it, when one of the betas lost control, which hadn't happened in a long time. So, deferring to no one except one person once, wasn't really going to be particularly challenging.

As soon as they parked the car, they could see how the curtains were being pulled away inside the house. Seeing the house was a little bit of a shock. It looked beautiful in its own right. It wasn't one of those cookie-cutter-everything-is-new houses. It had nooks and crannies and a beautiful garden, scattered with toys and wild flowers. It looked like a well lived in old home, as it towered slightly above the smaller trees surrounding it's little clearing.

He took a deep breath and gave Lydia what he hoped was a reassuring look, as they both started to exit the car and walked towards the front door of the house.

Once they moved towards the porch, the door sprang open and they were faced with a young, dare he say nervous, Peter, "Who are you and what do you want here?"

Stiles needed a moment to collect himself. He took a deep breath and said in an even voice "We request a meeting with your alpha. We're here to announce our presence in Beacon Hills out of respect to the local pack."

Before Peter could say anything else, a dark haired older woman, with red flashing eyes stood in the door. She pressed "Peter, inside, now." through her teeth, using her alpha voice.

She pulled rank on a member of her pack, her family, in front of strangers. Stiles didn't need to know werewolf etiquette, to know that was a slight against Peter.

He schooled his features and waited for the alpha to make the next move. Lydia however, seemed to have another idea. She stepped forward lowered her eyes intentionally for a moment and smiled friendly and open at Talia Hale. "Hello Mrs. Hale, my husband and I just moved into our new apartment in Beacon Hills and we wanted to introduce ourselves to you."

There were no lies in that. He basically was Lydia's husband. They'd signed the paperwork and everything. Since she said they just moved into their new apartment and not to Beacon Hills, everything rang true. Stiles was impressed.

When Talia looked at him next, he moved his neck to the side, slightly baring his throat. The bigger threat had to make the stronger gesture, that was customary. After that the mood changed fairly quickly.

Talia's eyes turned into a warm hazel-color and she smiled friendly, "My name is Talia Hale. I'm the Alpha responsible for Beacon County. You're right, that you have to announce your presence, if you intend to live in my territory, but I don't particularly care for people who show up uninvited at my house. Even less so, when they appear to be just human."

Ignoring the condescending attitude, he kept his face open, not willing to let her know how underwhelmed he was by her overall performance. It didn't help that he was still judging her for what happened to the Derek in his timeline. This was too important.

Lydia's smile never wavered when she said, "We've been in Beacon Hills for the last couple of days and no one approached us, which is why we wanted to meet with you. The last years have been very challenging for us and we hoped that we could start over here. Us not approaching you, could have been viewed as a slight."

She sighed at that. "If every human that moves to Beacon County and has some miniscule connection to something supernatural, would come to my house and request a formal discussion, I'd never be able to get anything done."

Lydia's smile twitched slightly, and Stiles sighed in resignation. He couldn't let his personal feelings for her get in the way of what needed to be done. Also, Lydia had been a trooper. He should take over now.

"Mrs. Hale, we're here today, because we need to be, not because we want to. We are interested in an alliance. I am sorry we inconvenienced you. However, we really think that we could both benefit from this."

Talia laughed at that, "You're human. How are we going to benefit from any of this? It looks more like you are the ones that need protection."

"Well, we're mostly human. I think? It never really mattered before. Anyway, we're not here to ask for your protection."

Lydia gave him a look. He didn't feel good about telling Talia what he was. Not in the open anyway, with a whole house of people he didn't know and couldn't place listening in.

"I can see that we've put you in an uncomfortable position. We could arrange another meeting? One further away from your home, if that's more comfortable for you. It would be optimal if we could meet those who'll know and keep our secret. If we'd tell you what we are now, we would be sharing that information with a house full of strangers. It's nothing personal, we just had some bad experiences."

Talia looked at them thoughtfully. Their scent was human, and she's met enough people who had been self-entitled, arrogant idiots, that talked her ear off, which was why she'd taken to trying to scare them off. You can only listen to so many half-fairies, going on about what an important pillar of the community they were and that they'd help, if she, the fucking alpha, ever needed them. However, the man before her behaved strangely. He had not once been afraid, he'd looked to his wife reassuringly a few times and he hadn't let her mocking affect him. He held himself with a calm, calculating confidence that was not something that she's ever seen in such a young man.

"Bad experiences?"

The girl, Lydia answered this time, she eyed her husband for a second, before talking. "As I said, we had a rough couple of years. One of our more memorable ones, were with rouge hunters. We like to be sure that our trust is well deserved."

At the mention of the hunters the scent of the man changed into utter primal disdain, which his face didn't betray. Curious. That level of self-control is not something you could see often.

She looked at them both empathetically. "We don't have hunters in Beacon Hills." She assured.

The man didn't say anything about that. He just looked at her. The girl, Lydia, however winced. "We would like to believe that."

She sighed. They didn't. Whatever happened to these kids, it had been bad enough that they decided to implore the local alpha of the county for a pack meeting, before giving up any real personal information. They even witnessed her using her alpha voice and stood through her mockery and they still had no intention of letting it go. Hell, the guy basically told her, they could come back later. She couldn't help herself, she smiled at them.

"You have to excuse my rude behavior, I don't harbor any ill intent towards human, there are a few in my pack. We've just been getting a lot of requests lately. I had hoped I could discourage you, as I did the others. If we would just let anybody speak before us, we'd have a lot of feral omegas, roam around these woods."

Stiles could respect that. He had done a lot more than being unwelcoming to protect his pack. He shrugged, nodded and said, "No hard feelings."

Talia's smiled even wider now, she looked positively wolfish when she nodded and said

"Alright, I assume everyone heard? … No, we're not having this meeting on the porch. … I don't care. It was your decision to stay up late. … Get in the living room! … Because I said so."

The sight of Talia arguing with her children left them feeling sad. This was so weirdly domestic. Lydia leaned back against him, as they watched Talia move back inside the house.

Looking up, they saw that Talia gestured for them to follow her into the house.

Walking into the Hale's living room was not an intimidating experience. It really wasn't. The impromptu 'pack meeting' had ripped people away from the thing they had been doing up until now, which resulted in a lot of people wearing pajamas and finishing the last of their breakfast or morning coffee, as they sat in a half circle to leave room for the newcomers.

Kids were playing on the ground, there were two babies, one in the arms of a beautiful blonde woman, with a messy bun and a tired face, the other asleep on a somewhat aggravating looking Peter Hale. There were a lot of people in that living room. Aunts and Uncles, Cousins, some people were his age, others were older, Derek and Cora were the only ones he recognized right away. Cora leaned against an elderly woman, who let her fingers slide through her hair. Derek sat there grumpily, with his tousled hair, flannel pajama bottoms and an oversized shirt and stared at them. Legit stared, the whole shebang, wide eyed, with pink ears and a look of horror that translated into his body language. Great.

Suffice to say, the scene hit him like a freight train. Peter Hale holding a baby. All the kids and adults sitting easily together, just letting him and Lydia into the heart of their home. Before they even told them what they were. God, taking in the room he quickly realized that the only other person, aside from them and Talia Hale, that stood freely and would be able to move to either help or attack was probably her grandpa. The dude looked like he was pushing eighty, fast.

This felt insane. How could they trust them so easily? When they'd come up with their set-up for the pack meetings, there had never once been the thought tossed around, 'Just sit where ever, dude.' 'Grab a baby while you're at it.' 'I don't have a baby available, can I bring my pet goldfish instead?' 'Half asleep? Me too, bro.' 'Do you know what today is? It's bring-your-grandparents-to-work-day, bitches.' 'Yeah dude, then we'll have seniority over the other packs and shit.'

It's not like they didn't trust in their ability to protect their own, it's just that they'd never put themselves in a position, in which they'd be this vulnerable. Even if they were just 'human', he'd seen enough humans do horrifying things. God. Peaceful times made people fucking stupid.

His emotional turmoil must have translated into his scent because everyone in the room was now staring at him.

He felt his heart pounding fast and Lydia tightened her grip on him in a way that could have been seen as reassuring, but he'd bet she also struggled with the ease, with which they'd been trusted or maybe she noticed the geriatric security system. What even.

There was no point in pretending, because everyone clearly smelled that something was up. "Sorry. Trust issues." He elaborated, while trying to keep his expression blank.

"What do you mean by that?" Talia looked at him imploringly.

"He means, that if we had ever trusted so easily, we would have been dead a long time ago." Lydia's voice cut through the silence like a knife.

Yep, definitely struggling. However, this line of conversation wasn't what they'd planned and well, quite frankly, it wouldn't do anybody any good if Lydia decided everybody needs a lecture on common sense. They wanted their trust, not their exasperation.

He rubbed small circles on her arm, trying to reassure her. "Lydia, it's fine."

She blinks at him furiously. "Tell that to yourself, I'm not the one, who looks like I'm about to rip my hair out."

Stiles struggled with himself after that, because he'd really fallen in love with the comeback 'No, more like a throat or two.', but he also knew that there was no way he could say that in this situation. Being quick-witted was his curse. Oh well.

He carefully pried her hand off him and pulled her into a hug. There was an indignant noise coming from where he pressed her against his chest. "I'm not sad you idiot, I'm mad." He lets his arms fall to his sides (because he could respect boundaries, thank you very much). However, Lydia was now death-grip-hugging him, pressing her face into his chest. He snorted at that, only to receive a muffled, but somehow still fierce, "Shut up."

The whole room had watched their little interaction. Talia looked like she wanted to hug them both, which was decidedly not helping. He gave her a curt nod, "Right. PTSD, it happens. Anyway, could we…" He turned his head towards the front door and back at Talia. "for a moment? I think we could use some fresh air."

She nodded. "Of course."

Not even bothering to pry Lydia off, he just motioned towards the door, letting her press herself against him while he carefully navigated them both outside.

Ones they got away from curious looks. She started shaking her head as she looked up at him. There was raw anger in her eyes. "Every bad thing…" she struggled to convey what she was feeling, knowing, that the pack was still listening.

But he understood. Every bad thing they'd gone through, they paid dearly for, it made them hard, suspicious, hypervigilant, had ripped away their friends and loved ones one by one…. Every bad thing that brought them to this point, had started here. With these easy trusting, chilled out people, who didn't bother keeping tabs on the hunters in town.

Hell, they had no idea, a banshee and a spark had time travelled back. That spell must have left some kind of whiplash of something. Never mind the fact, that these people had a pack meeting with two strangers, in their fucking pajamas, with their kids present. It was hard for them not to judge. It would be even harder to convince them of turning their living room get together into some kind of war council. It wasn't like they had any incentive. Peaceful times, man.

"Lyds, that's why we're here and why we're doing this. Being carefree is not a fucking sin." He whispered calmly, knowing that they'd probably heard half of what was being said, but he didn't care. He had to calm her and himself the fuck down.

"It was for us!" she whisper-screamed. "They brought babies to a meeting with two random strangers. I love you, but you look seriously shady when you blank-face people, Stiles."

He snorted. "Jesus Lydia, tell me how you really feel."

She loosened her grip on him slightly and took a deep breath, before looking back to the house.

"I think we should go back in."

He nodded.

Going back inside was super awkward. They'd definitely listened in, which was evident by the lack of babies and children and a very tense atmosphere. The adults and teens were now somewhat skeptical of them, which he couldn't really blame them for. The way everyone was still sprawled out all over the place, eating breakfast and what not, gave him a little hope that they didn't completely lose their trust.

One look at Lydia made it clear that he'd do the talking this time.

"So, I'm Stiles Stillinski, this is my wife Lydia. We've been hunted for what we are before, so let me keep this short and sweet, we don't appreciate it if our secret is shared without prior consent from us." He looked around the room, making eye contact with everyone present, at last his eyes rested on Derek, Kate couldn't find out about him and Lydia so he put everything into an extra stern look for him. Convinced he had their attention, he continued, "I'm a spark, she's a banshee. We're both trained in what we do, which would be setting wards for me, and predicting death for her. Someone recently pointed out to me, that I can come across as shady." He stared long and hard at Lydia, who was back at the clawing at his arm business. "I'm not. In fact, to proof my good intentions, I'd like to ward your house and extended property against evil. If you have an emissary you trust, I'd be more than willing to show him what kind of wards I have in mind and he can draw them, while I power them, either way the offer stands." He congratulated himself on his new strategy: wrap this up, fast. Keep it light. They didn't have to be depressing all the time.

"You believe you're a spark?"

Talia Hale was not someone who took lightly to being insulted. Having her competence questioned by the banshee had been hard enough, but now she was supposed to believe that this young man was a spark? Even though she knew there hadn't been one in California in the last ten years.

"I'm a spark." His heartbeat was nice and steady. The girl's heartbeat however got faster by the second. "Stiles she wants you to proof it."

"Yes, in fact I'd like to see why you'd think that you are a spark, when the last documented sighting of one was over seven years ago."

Stiles sighed. He slowly pulled away the hoodie, but before he could throw it on the table or on a chair, Lydia snagged it and pulled it over herself. She must be feeling extremely uncomfortable, if she resorted to public hoodie stealing.

Everyone looked at the tattoos first and at the bloody crescent marks Lydia's nails had left on his forearm, second.

A very apologetic "Sorry." was mumbled into his sweater. He prodded the marks, "Don't get cute with me. The last time someone told us to demonstrate, you went for the knife block, this is like the fluff version." Stiles didn't need her feeling worse for something as inane as this. She seemed especially on edge, so he decided she could do with some distraction, plus that story was sure to get a rise out of her.

Everybody stared at Lydia in shook. Lydia however just looked at her nails. "I remember you asking me to make it dramatic." He smiled. It worked.

The tattoo on his chest, right above his heart started to glow golden, it could be seen through the shirt and moments later, the wound on his arm disappeared.

"Yeah and I regret nothing, the look on his face, was pretty hilarious. However, the blood was a bitch to get out, so next time please don't go for the throat."

"She stabbed you in the throat?" Peter stared alarmed at Lydia, petite, pristine Lydia, who looked absolutely adorable in his hoodie.

Lydia leveled him with a very defensive look. "He moved around too much."

Stiles snorted again. "Yeah, it was almost like I was trying not to get stabbed."

The beautiful blonde, sans baby, giggled. The truth was that it hadn't been that bad and honestly, he was being a little over dramatic, but the room could do with some snark, light banter, anything really that wasn't adding to the depressing. God, it said a lot about him, that he categorized that one time one of his closest friends stabbed him in the throat on accident as fun times. Jesus fucking Christ.

Since nobody acknowledged his awesome glowing-tattoo-healing-scratch-marks-spark-mojo, he started his next 'trick', which was a ball of light, that continuously dispersed into smaller ones, and he kept it going until the whole room was filled with shimmering little circles of light that floated, wherever. The runes in the tattoo at the back of his neck and another two on his right arm, shimmered golden.

Lydia blushed slightly, "I was trying to slightly cut your shoulder, since that was the only place where your skin was visible, because of that ridiculous sweater." He remembered. He had fucking loved that sweater. She huffed indignantly. "You started to flail, and I slipped." Now she was watching him pointedly, arms crossed over her chest. "Every time you tell the story, you make it sound like I was trying to straight up murder you in cold blood. Also, you would have absolutely been able to stop me." "Yeah well, evidently, adrenaline-riddled-me would rather take a knife to the throat, then punch you in the face. Go figure."

"Jesus Fucking Christ. That's just unhealthy, you need to check up on that."

"Language!" Even if Talia Hale, was impressed with the display of power, there would be no cursing in front of her.

"Sorry." Lydia had the galls to look guilty. She probably thought about the kids that could very well hear her from everywhere in the house. The light balls continued to disperse and flowed freely into the garden.

He looked expectantly at Talia, "So where do you want those wards?"