Aiden returned to Lydia's parent's home nearly an hour after he had left the loft, tending to their regular activities which included homework and may or may not have involved some personal exploration of human and werewolf biology. Once the pair had finished with the more hypothetical of the situations they went back downstairs to have dinner with Lydia's mother, her father off doing something that the other didn't truly care about. Their divorce was still being finalized but Lydia's mother had learned ever since the incident the years before on the football field, after having been told by her teacher that she was excelling far faster than her fellow students, and after nearly having her killed by one of her teachers, to be more attentive of her daughter. This was actually working rather well for Lydia; it was nice actually having someone there for her when she was home instead of being isolated to her room all the time. Especially now that she had realized she was a banshee of all things it was nice having something to keep her focused and to help her mind not reel out of control. It wasn't as bad at school, not with all of the classes and people to keep her mind engaged. But at home there wasn't always that guarantee that she'd be able to keep her mind off of things she didn't want to end up falling headlong into.
"So how are things going at school? How's the gossip pool?" Lydia's mother asked as she finished up her relatively small meal, Aiden looking down at his plate and inwardly whimpering at the seemingly microscopic portions, at least to his eyes.
"Gossip is running a bit dry, drama is high as usual, but then again what do you expect from a bunch of teenagers?" Lydia replied with a shrug before taking a minuscule bite of her own meal.
"Yeah and then there's always substitute teachers jumping off of the roof." Aiden added in a low mumble earning an eye roll from Lydia and a short nervous cough from her mother as she covered her mouth. "Sorry, thought she said trauma for a second." Aiden said tensing up and drawing in toward himself a bit. Lydia's mother nodded sharply and put her napkin down before looking over to her daughter.
"Alright, and classes are going alright? You've been able to avoid any more episodes I hope." she said as she began eating again. Aiden just looked on wondering how it was possible for these two women to live off of such a small amount of food.
"Yes, everything has been fine mother; grades are at a steady A across the board, having some issues adjusting to dealing with a new teaching style every other month." Lydia replied with a sigh as she made her way over her plate taking select parts of her meal and chewing them thoroughly before swallowing, everything seemed mechanical, analytic to her actions, almost as though something were occupying her thoughts.
Aiden looked over for a moment before reaching over and gently taking her hand in his, the look he gave asking 'Are you okay?'
Lydia glanced to her hand and then up at Aiden with a small smile, but her eyes and her heartbeat told Aiden everything he needed to know. Lydia had confirmed what he had figured. She was about to scream, not just a typical girly shriek at something like a bug, someone was going to die, Aiden was just hoping it wasn't anyone they knew, or anyone in the room for that matter.
"And how are things going for you two lovebirds?" Lydia's mother asked looking at their joined hands with a fond glimmer on her smiling face.
"Things are going fine for us, not too many hiccups so far, a few little couple spats but those are to be expected." Lydia replied waving her hand in the air dismissively.
"Well that's good, you know Aiden you seem to be a much better person than her last boyfriend." Lydia's mother said as she soon finished off her meal and moved her plate and utensils to the dishwasher.
Lydia could see the slight tension in Aiden at the reference to Jackson, it may have been a compliment but he'd always had an issue being constantly reminded of the fact that she had been Jackson's long before she was his. She had a mate, and in a way he always felt as though she wasn't really his, and that he was just a distraction to her. Even though he'd never admit it he'd wanted to have the same thing between himself and Lydia that his brother had in Danny. He was playing along for now, but he wondered if he'd ever be able to get over this feeling, or if Lydia could ever bring herself to really move on from Jackson.
Lydia finished up her meal and watched as Aiden practically inhaled his own, he'd likely end up snagging something on his way back to the penthouse that he and Ethan were still staying in, Deucalion having the decency to keep the funds moving for them. He may not be their Alpha anymore, not after he was disgraced by Scott and Derek, but he still felt responsible for them. Regardless the pair got up from the table and put their dishes away in turn and followed Lydia's mother to the living room to watch some television the news was wrapping up and another unexplained death was broadcast one of the neighboring towns, but the method caused Lydia to grip Aiden's hand a bit more firmly than may have been appropriate. The person had drowned in a shallow stream, no evidence of having been unconscious of knocked out, no drugs. So either they drowned themselves, or had been held under the water. The lack of ligature marks on the neck or bruising on the shoulders suggested the former though.
"Lydia?" Aiden asked when his girlfriend's grip was beginning to near uncomfortable. She looked over and then back at the screen, that must have been the person who's death she'd just forecast earlier at dinner. But there was more to it than that; meanwhile Lydia's mother seemed to have not really noticed what was being exchanged between them. "Do we need to go upstairs?" he asked as he moved to stand before Lydia shook her head.
"No, we need to go to Derek; I need to let him know something." Lydia said softly enough for Aiden to hear before she got up and made for the door. "Aiden and I are going to go over to his place tonight, okay mom?" Lydia asked as she waited for her boyfriend to follow suit.
"Alright, just make sure he wraps up if anything happens while you're there." Her mother said still looking at the T.V. screen. She was trying, but she still had a ways to go before she was mother of the year. With that though the pair rushed off back to the loft where the Smucz-Hale pack was now recuperating.
"So um, yeah, when are we going to get something to eat? I'm absolutely starving." Cora said as for the third time in a row her stomach rumbled unhappily. "I'm starting to understand exactly what my stomach is saying, it's speaking wolf." she groaned in a similar fashion to her stomach.
"Well until I'm certain no one is going to pass out again I can't start cooking now can I?" Stiles said as he looked over at her, his hand no linked with Derek's as they sat up on their makeshift bed. That seemed enough to quiet both Cora and her displeased stomach. "Al how are you doing, you think you're awake enough to handle something to eat?" Stiles asked looking over to the gypsy wolf on the other side of the room.
"Let me put it to you this way, if you don't start cooking soon I'm going to have to start chewing my own arm for sustenance." Al said as he looked over at Stiles and then playfully began nibbling at his own arm. Stiles smiled and got out of the bed leaving a gentle kiss on Derek's forehead before heading over to the cooking station.
"Hey mom, mind helping me figure out what I can make here?" Stiles asked opening the fridge and freezer and seeing a little lack of material to work with. "I'm going to take a wild guess here and say today was supposed to be grocery day." he added as he turned to look at the pack and was met with three growling stomachs. "Right, okay what can I do mom?" he asked as Claudia's spirit glided over to him, that was definitely still a bit unnerving, then again maybe he was just too used to the sounds of heels clicking across the floor, or even claws scraping against it for the soundless movement to register well.
"Well, I see soup, I see bread, let's see, cheese, macaroni…aha, tomato macaroni soup and grilled cheese." Claudia said poking her head through a few doors as she scanned the little makeshift kitchen on this part of the large main room. "Hmmm, that or tuna melts, maybe you should check with the rest of them." Claudia added pointing her spectral thumb over to the wolves. Stiles took her lead and moved over to them.
"Okay so tomato macaroni soup and tuna melts sound good?" he asked, though it seemed moot at this point, all of them were simply glaring hungrily. "Okay, okay, chef Stiles to the rescue." Stiles added whipping back around and quickly getting to work on the meal, praying that he wouldn't have to somehow fend off a bunch of starving werewolves while he was preparing this.
Just as he'd begun plating the sandwiches and ladling the soup into bowls he saw a shadow looming up behind him and he felt himself tense up a little only to see Scott move over to help him carry things back over. "Figured that despite your excellent balance skills you could use some help." the younger Alpha said with a smirk.
"Uh-huh, yeah, real nice Scott, maybe I should pick on you more too." Stiles said in return making his way over to Derek and nearly tripping over himself on the way there, inwardly cursing himself as he regained his balance. "One word Scott and you're getting a bowl of hot soup poured down your pants." Stiles warned as he could practically feel the held back laughter from his best friend.
"Okay, I promise I won't mention how glad we should all be that your middle name isn't grace." Scott said unable to hold back any longer.
"Cora, I'm sorry, but I may have to kill your almost boyfriend." Stiles said after he put the bowl and plate down on a small table beside Derek waiting for Scott to make his way over to her before going over and play-strangling him, the pair laughing it out and moving on to bring over Al's meal in turn. "Okay folks, dig in." Stiles added only now realizing he and Scott didn't have anything to eat, the last of it had ended up being split between the recovering lycanthropes.
"What about you two? Are either of you going to have anything to eat?" Cora asked as she made the same observation.
"Ah, that is why it pays off to have a cell phone that has the local pizza place on speed dial. Please with all the times we've been over here do you think I hadn't made sure we stayed well supplied?" Stiles said as he pulled his phone out and called it in.
"And why didn't you think to order us pizza instead of giving us this?" Cora added in with an annoyed expression.
"Please, if I know you like I do, you're going to have pizza anyway, this is just a warm up so that you won't eat me while we have to wait for the pizza to get here…hello, yeah, three meat lovers pizzas and one supreme please, yep…yes that same place. Yes I realize this place is creepy…damnit I'm paying for it I don't care if you're expecting Dracula to swoop down and make you his minion…okay thank you, goodbye." Stiles said replying to both Cora and the person on the other end of the line.
"Okay, I'm guessing that person has been here more than once." Álmos replied as he like the other werewolves had likely heard the other side of the conversation.
"Yeah, I think it's the same guy who came here last time, and the time before that…hell I think they just keep sending the same person, that or they have clones of him they just mass produce." Stiles said with a shrug as he made his way back over to Derek and sat down beside him and began to feed him himself, Cora rolling her eyes and Derek smirking a bit.
"You know I can't say I've ever been pampered quite like this, if it weren't for the fact that it nearly took me dying for it to happen I'd say we should do this more often." the hazel eyed man said as he leaned in and kissed Stiles gently.
"Heh, no, let's not have something like this happen again, I could do without that." Stiles added as his fragmented memories of going deer mode were beginning to organize themselves. "As much as being a deer is fun, I really don't want to risk it during hunting season." he added with a shake of his head.
"I understand babe, and don't worry, I am not going to let some dumbass with a shotgun use you for target practice even if you do get all fuzzy again." Derek teased harmlessly as rubbed their foreheads together gently.
"Well if it weren't for the fact that our old house is burnt to the ground I'd say we could all move back out there, hunters were banned from the area, and then with the preserve that's even more space for Bambi here to go leaping around when the mood hits." Cora said with a wicked little smirk.
Derek and Stiles both just glared at her, Derek due to the mention of the old house, bringing back some very bad memories, and Stiles for the obvious Disney inspired insult.
"I might be clumsy, and I might be prone to turning into a deer but I can at least tell the difference between a skunk and a flower." Stiles said coldly as he heard a knock at the door, moving over and expecting the pizza delivery man, only to see Aiden and Lydia standing there with the boxes.
"You guys owe us for these." Lydia said as she stormed in and made her way over to Derek, looking down at his still seemingly vulnerable state. "Man demanded we pay and then bolted, you guys seriously need to find someone less prone to wetting themselves." she added looking over to Scott and Stiles.
"Um, you guys mind explaining what you're doing here?" Scott asked from where he was sitting with Cora on the couch.
"Thought you guys should know there was another suicide, drowning, in a stream. Scott, it sounds almost identical to how you guys found out Matt had been killed." Lydia said as she looked over at the younger of the two Alphas in the room.
"Wait, Matt as in crazy Allison, Jackson puppet-master, killed by Grandpa Argent Matt?" Stiles stammered as he fumbled around a little in the air with his hands, very visibly freaked out.
"I can't say for certain it's him, but if Al's grandfather has brought him back to life we could be in some serious trouble." Lydia said as she moved over to one of the beanbag chairs. And sat down, followed closely by Aiden. "Speaking of Al, I love what you've done with the place, very Bohemian revival." she said, the place had been far from as pleasant looking the last time she had been here, the ceiling skylight had been repaired, the glass and blood cleared out and it was actually refurbished into a respectable looking environment.
"I'm going to assume this is your banshee friend?" Álmos said as he looked over to Stiles and Scott, the both of them nodding. "Well then I take that as I high compliment Ms. Martin, I have been told you're quite the fashionista." he added with a warm smile.
"Quite the fashionista? I am the fashionista around here." Lydia corrected Álmos with a playful little smirk.
"And oh so modest I see." Álmos teased as he stirred a bit on his bed and sat up straighter, Lydia looking at him with a mix of amusement and haughtiness. "You're certainly a refreshing individual to say the least Lydia; glad to see that there's at least one potent female presence around here that isn't a disembodied spirit." Álmos added, sighing.
"If I didn't know better I'd swear your cousin is trying to keep up with my level of sass." Lydia said looking over at Derek before going back to look at the Romani. "I have to say it's always nice to have someone who isn't intimidated by me to hold a conversation with, better than most of the ones I have to deal with at school./" Lydia added with a slight flip of her hair, her honey colored eyes resting back on the older Alpha of the room. "So, you're this Álmos I kept hearing about then, glad to see your fashion sense is as good as your interior decorating or I'd have to take you out shopping with me, and believe me, as anyone here could likely attest, that is not a journey for the light hearted." Lydia added with a pert little smirk.
"And forgive some of us for not being among the living." came the voice of Stiles mother as her ghost slipped through the room seemingly sweeping over areas where Álmos' wards had begun to weaken a little.
"Stiles…was that…?" Lydia asked as the image filtered through a wall and appeared on the other side.
"Lydia, my mother, Mom, Lydia Martin." Stiles said introducing the two of them as his mother's ghost moved back into the main room.
"I'd shake your hand dear, but I'm dead, pleasure to meet you though, heaven knows how much Stiles has mentioned you over the years. You know you're lucky I didn't haunt you for a bit just to get you to notice my son." Claudia said with a light chuckle, one Lydia didn't join in on.
"I'm sorry?" Lydia said as she tried and failed to pull her attention from the spirit. "So hold on then, why isn't she trying to possess or kill someone? Did Álmos' grandfather raise her?" she asked sideway toward Stiles.
"Allow me to put it into simple terms, István represents a great force of darkness that refuses to die, as such in order for the balance of nature to be maintained there has to be a great force of light to counter him, hence why I've been around to help keep him from slaughtering half the town. I can't stop everything, but I can at least hold him back from unleashing all hell." Claudia responded to answer her question.
Lydia nodded her head comprehending the logic behind it. "That would certainly explain things, still back to why I came here, I'm worried that this might start getting more difficult if Matt's spirit has been brought back from the dead, heaven knows he has a vendetta against all of us." she said trying to turn her mind back to the reason she'd come here.
"If it is him we should be fine, unless he somehow tries to possess someone, but even then he's killed most of the people he wanted revenge against, and we're pretty much safe from him unless he can manage to grab one of us on our own." Scott said as he looked to Stiles for confirmation, Stiles just nodded, now chewing a little on his lower lip as he thought things over. Matt Daehler coming back from the dead was more than just dangerous, it was downright terrifying, he may not have anyone left to kill from his first trip around but he'd want himself, Scott, Allison, Lydia, Isaac, even Danny dead in a heartbeat. "Stiles I'm not sure I like that look." Scott said breaking Stiles out of his train of thought.
"If Matt is back he may not be able to possess us that easily, but I could easily see him going after people at the school, maybe even swim team members." Stiles said as he took a deep breath.
"Or even lacrosse players." Claudia said as she settled in beside Al on his bed, still helping him recover whether he wanted it or not. "After what you all did he might see it as an easy way to get to the lot of you, and to cause even more chaos and keep you distracted." Claudia added looking to Scott and her son.
"I'd rather not think about that too much, I already have a plan I want to enact, but I need to run it by Deaton and by Al here of course." Stiles said immediately catching the older werewolf's attention.
"What kind of plan are you thinking of, and why do I get the feeling that it could either end really well or really badly?" Al asked as he crossed his legs on his bed.
"Well you guys know what the name of the next full moon is right?" Stiles asked getting a few confused looks from Lydia, Scott, Cora and Aiden but clear and almost worried looks from his mother, Derek and Al.
"The Hunter's Moon, yes what about it? You don't intend for us to use it as an opportunity to strike out at him, you saw what he did to us earlier, he'd be just as powerful then." Derek said as he made to get out of his bed.
"No, not exactly." Stiles said as he pulled out the pendant Deaton had given him. "But this guy might be able to help." Stiles said as the pendant twirled a little between his fingers. "I did some research, and if I can, I want to try and use the Hunter's Moon as a focus to call on the Wild Hunt." Stile added as he looked over to where his mother's spirit sat looking very focused and contemplative.
"That idea is a good one, but you understand you're risking unleashing something just as dangerous as István to deal with him yes?" Claudia said looking at her son. "It's by far the lesser of the two evils, you're not likely to kill anyone who doesn't have it coming already, but you understand the dangers of doing this don't you?" she asked as she looked her son over.
"It's only dangerous if the hunt loses focus of the main target, if I can get it to recognize the threat István poses they'll go after that like a bunch of British nobles going after a fox." Stiles said as he held the pendant in his palm. "And if I really am supposed to be some sort of high priest type than maybe the Horned God will listen a bit more intently." Stiles added as he moved back over to sit next to Derek.
"He may not listen to you alone, but I think if you and Derek were to both request an audience of sorts he might. You represent the two halves of nature, the prey, and the predator, the passive and aggressive." Claudia said moving her hand between the two as she spoke. "The stag, and the wolf." she concluded with a soft smile. "
"Bambi and the Big Bad Wolf." Cora chimed in only to regret it as both Derek and Stiles went over and proceeded to tickle her mercilessly.