The Other Scott

by the Lady of the Mists

Chapter Ten: Demonic Allegiance

Lily suppressed a sigh as she and Lucas headed into the school together, ignoring the whisperings of the fellow students. It had been a day since they had read the spell together, but so far no powers had shown up. Lucas had expressed concerns that they hadn't inherited any of these powers that they were supposed to have received, after all, but Lily reasoned that they would probably show up right when they needed them the most.

"Think Nathan's going to come today?" Lily questioned as she glanced around the courtyard, looking for their younger brother.

"I dunno. He's probably still dealing with everything, though. It might take him a few days to get it all settled in his mind. I know that I'm still trying to wrap my mind around it all." Lucas sighed. "You know, I still think that there might be something that we're missing."

"Like what?" Lily questioned as they took a seat outside. "You mean with Dan and Keith?"

"Yeah. The way that Keith was talking to me when I was unconscious, when he took me back to the school that day, it was like I was missing something, like I had forgotten something at the school that day." Lucas sighed. "I don't know, Lily, maybe there's something that day that I've pushed out of my mind. Something that I thought was too insignificant to be important. I can't think of anything that Keith would be trying to tell me."

His sister frowned slightly at him before glancing down at her watch. "Well, we've still got about an hour before our first class, so why don't you take me through that day and see if we can't jog your memory." Lily shrugged. "It's worth a shot."

Lucas nodded. "Okay." He stood up and Lily followed her brother through the school, to the library. "This is where I found Peyton, bleeding to death. She'd been shot by the gun Jimmy fired." He paused. "I don't think that he meant it, though. Jimmy Edwards couldn't hurt anybody, let alone . . ." But he didn't need to finish that thought.

"But he didn't," Lily told him reassuringly. "We both know that, Luke." She rubbed her brother's arm and he shook his head, trying to clear it, before heading out of the library. "Luke?"

Her brother didn't answer and she hurried after him, trying to keep up with his long strides. "Lucas!" she called. "Luke, will you please slow down?" Suddenly, he came to an abrupt stop and she almost slammed into him.

Once she had regained her composure, she looked at their surroundings and saw that they were in the hallway. A few of the students who passed the two siblings gave them strange looks, but otherwise ignored them.

"When I was carrying Peyton out," Lucas said in a quiet voice, "Jimmy found us here in the hallway. Keith came to try and help him, convinced him to let us go. That was the last time that I ever saw him alive." His voice was constricted.

Lily's heart pained for her brother and for a moment that contained an eternity, she felt her vision flicker and a hazy picture formed in front of her eyes. In that moment, she didn't see the students gathering their books and bags, heading for class. She saw an empty hallway, save for her brother, Peyton Sawyer, their Uncle Keith, and a boy she guessed was Jimmy Edwards. And as Keith shielded Lucas from Jimmy holding the gun on them, she saw Lucas's eyes flicker towards Jimmy. And over the gun, in the hallway, someone was peering out from the blinds, staring at everything.

Almost as quickly as it had come, Lily's vision was corrected and her vision returned to normal. Blinking a few times, she looked around them and towards her brother, who was looking at her worriedly.

"Lily? What's the matter?"

"Not here," she said in an undertone. She didn't know what had just happened, but she knew one thing; that wasn't just some daydream. There was no doubt in her mind that the vision she'd just had was a true predicament.

Of the past.

On the day of their uncle's death.

Which meant that if the vision had indeed been true, there was someone who could have possibly seen what had really happened on the day of their uncle's death. And could help them to clear Jimmy Edwards's name.

She just had to figure out who it had been.

--

Nathan stepped into the beach house, closing the door silently behind him. He knew that his father had to be here. There was nowhere else that he could go. Dozens of police officers were looking for him and were going to arrest him on sight. This was the one place that they hadn't looked.

After he had gone to confront his father, he had found the police station in chaos and had managed to piece together what had happened from the scraps of conversation from the police. Apparently, Dan had attacked two of the guards on duty and killed one of them. The other one had sustained a major head injury and was still lying unconscious in the hospital at Tree Hill. If his father hadn't been a murderer before, he most certainly was now.

And Nathan would've sworn that he wasn't capable of such an act two days ago.

Closing the door behind him, Nathan looked around the empty room, taking a deep breath. "Dad?" he called. "Dad, I know that you're here. Come on, we need to talk."

Hearing a noise in the back of the house, Nathan immediately went to go investigate, listening carefully to the voices that he heard as he pressed his ear against the door to the two people that were talking. One was his father. The other was a silky and slithery voice, one that made the hairs on Nathan's neck stand up.

"I do not care what you think, Scott, you have dishonoured the name that I have given you. After years of loyal service, you brought shame to the name of warlocks everywhere. We needed someone in a position of power for our plan to succeed. With you as mayor, we gained the upper hand and no witch would be able to stop us. But you had to act recklessly, didn't you? First to take the blame for that half-witted son of yours and then completely lose it when you learned of your daughter."

"That was a mistake, but I have more than made up for that." Dan was speaking now. "I have ways of getting what we want without my being mayor, my lord."

"You are lucky that I do not kill you here and now, Scott," the slithery voice was speaking again. "So I would advise you to keep your mouth shut for the time being. Your son may be half-demon, but his allegiance lies with good, not evil. Until that changes, he will never consider joining us. As long as that wife of his continues to corrupt him, he will never join his true calling. He belongs with us and Haley James stands in the way."

There was a short pause. "You want me to eliminate her, then, my lord?" Dan asked quietly.

"I want you to do as you are told and not screw everything up this time!" the slithery voice roared. "Someone else will take care of that wretched girl. All I want for you to do is turn your son to our side. Nothing more and nothing less. If I find that you have, even if it works in our favour, I will have your head on a plate. Am I understood?"

Dan took a deep breath. "Completely, my lord," he said quietly. Nathan sensed something that felt almost like fire and then the door opened, revealing Dan Scott.

His father had something of shock on his face when he saw his son standing there. "Are you trying to give me a heart attack, Nathan?" he snapped, glaring at the boy. "How much did you hear?"

"All of it," Nathan said, glaring at his father. "Are you telling me that everything that Lucas and Lily said was true and you didn't say one word? You were gonna let me believe that they were crazy for the rest of my life, Dad? And you were going to kill Haley? How could you do that?"

"You don't know the situation," Dan retorted as he walked past his son and into the kitchen. Pouring himself a glass of wine, he said, "Nathan, you don't know one thing about what is going on here."

"All I know is that you or that friend of yours in there is going to kill my wife and my child! Then what, Dad? You going to try and kill my brother and sister, too?" Nathan could feel his anger rising in him and out of the corner of his eyes, he saw something flicker that looked suspiciously like flames.

Turning around, he saw that a pillow had caught on fire and cursed, seizing a pitcher of water from the wine rack and tossing it on the flame, dousing the fire.

"How did that happen?" he muttered, turning back to look at his father. Dan was staring where the flames had been, something of realisation crossing his face.

"So they cast the spell," he said quietly. "How very convenient. Nathan," he said suddenly, "what if I were to offer you a place for the people that I work for? Would you be interested?"

"Not a chance," Nathan retorted, heading towards the door. He didn't want to listen to Dan's explanation about Keith now. He'd had enough answers for one day.

But Dan's next question stopped him in his tracks.

"What if it were to save the life of your wife and child? And your brother and sister? What if I made sure that they remained unharmed, so long as you remained loyal to our master? Would you consider joining then?"

Nathan took a deep breath, not looking back at his father. He would do anything to protect Haley and their son. And if he could protect Lucas and Lily at the same time, then . . .

"Maybe," he said slowly, turning around to face him. "But answer me this, Dad: did you kill Uncle Keith?"

Something of anger flashed behind his eyes and Dan looked away before returning his gaze to his son. "I made a mistake, all right?" he said quietly. "And I tried to make that right by protect you in that Daunte incident. Nathan, if I hadn't, then you would be sitting in jail right now!"

"Daunte died on impact from the incident!"

"But did you know that then?" Dan was smiling dangerously. "You're more like us than you know, Nathan. Now, I am offering you the chance to join us and your family will be left alone. No games, no tricks, I assure you," he said calmly. "Now, do you want to look down the road and find that something happened to them, mostly caused by us, and you could've done something to stop it? Won't you be regretting it then?"

"Don't you dare threaten any of them," Nathan warned.

"I'm merely stating facts, Nathan. Do you want to take the chance that something could happen to them? Or do you want to take this offered choice of granting them safety from us? Demons and warlocks will always come after them, no matter what, Nathan. Only if you pledge allegiance with us, in exchange for their safety, will they be protected."

Nathan took a deep breath and looked into his heart. He knew that Haley would never forgive him for this, but he knew that it was the only way to protect her. If something happened to her . . . or to their son . . . or to his brother and sister . . . he'd never forgive himself.

"One, they will never be harmed," Nathan warned him. "And you won't try and recruit them." Dan nodded. "And two, they never find out about this, all right? Ever."

Dan smiled maliciously. "Of course not. Whyever would we want to do something like that?"

"Then you've got a deal."