Waking up early was not an unfamiliar thing for Stiles.
He was always the first up in the house. The first to come downstairs and the first to make breakfast for himself and his dad.
There were several reasons for that, ranging from his ever-present energy thanks to his ADHD to his habit of making sure that his father always ate something before going to work.
He had already taken care of his dad and the said man was gone to the station, so the teen was left to his own thoughts. Thoughts that kept turning to his cousin and what said cousin shared with them the night before. He would be lying if he said that what Harry shared with their family didn´t shock him. Honestly, he never expected something like that to happen once his cousin was in the states, particularly right after he arrived at their house. But he was not complaining or freaking out. Far from it. He had seen his fair share of weird or scary things since he found out about werewolves and the supernatural world those months ago. Finding out that his cousin was a part of it if only because he had magic wasn´t even in the top ten of the WTF list he acquired since then. The only reason the thing even shocked him was how open and honest his cousin was about the thing with him and his father. It must have been hard, but he could understand the reasons behind that, especially after hearing the part about his cousin´s aunt and her family.
Thinking about said family, Stiles had to grimace. He already has his suspicion, based on the photo Harry sent him and on how thigh-lipped his cousin was about his early life in his letters. It painted an unpleasant picture in his mind, one which even his father shared once they talked about it. Clearly, his cousin had a hard time growing up, potentially even being abused in some form by his family. True, nobody would probably think about it seeing the raven now. But with magic, it was probably easy to fix whatever physical damage the abuse left on the teen´s body.
The physical one anyway, thought the brunet.
There was no knowledge about what psychological scars did it left on his cousin. And there had to be some, considering how vulnerable the wizard looked when last night when he told them about his magic and hinted that his aunt´s family had a bad reaction to it. It was clearly a sign of trust, as well as a test for them and their reaction. Stiles vowed to never abuse said trust and if possible, make it clear that he will be there for Harry.
Maybe I could start with sharing what I know about Beacon Hills´ supernatural world with him and dad, Stiles speculated.
Derek and the pack would probably kill him for it, but the cat was already out of the sack, so it didn´t matter anymore.
Not like one could keep quiet about supernatural things with a magic user in the household for the unforeseeable future. That just wasn´t possible. Besides he owned his father that much, so he should be honest like Harry.
He was pulled back to reality when he heard someone coming down the stairs.
"Morning!"
"Morning, Harry! How was the night?" asked Stiles as his cousin entered the kitchen.
"Restless, but I had worse," replied Harry with a wide yawn. "Noah already at work?"
"Yeah, his morning shifts are always early. Bad dreams?"
The rave shook his head. "Just my magic. Ever since I came to America, it has a hard time to settle and keeps me up most of the night."
"Really?"
"Yeah, though it might be because of the local natural magic. I heard it has strange effects on one´s core."
Hearing this, Stiles felt his curiosity grow. "Care to elaborate for the no-mage here?"
Harry thought about it, then shrugged and grabbed a cup of decaf and a plate of the healthy breakfast Stiles prepared beforehand. "Well, why not. It´s not like you didn´t already quiz me about magic last night." At Stiles´ mock-offended look he chuckled. "Just teasing, mate. Anyway, to explain the situation. Basically, the magic in North America runs wilder and stronger than in Britain. There are several reasons for this, the top among them the higher number of ley lines found on the continent, as well as the fact that the magic of the continent has a closer connection with nature. The latter is reflected by the palette of the magical creatures that reside here. Anyway, because of this, any wizard or witch that comes to America tends to experience the natural magic affecting their cores. The effect varies from person to person… Some feel a power-boost… some go through an unexpected creature inheritance… and some have trouble controlling their magic…" The teen yawned and rubbed his eyes, before continuing. "As I said, it varies. I have no idea what will it do to me, but hopefully, it will be nothing bad, since I still have control over my magic."
"Okay, I get the power-boost and the control loss," mused Stiles, over what his cousin just said. "But I´m a bit confused about the unexpected creature inheritance."
"I thought it was pretty self-explanatory."
"Humour me, bro."
"Alright. Basically one of your many-times grandparents had a child with a supernatural creature and you are the descendant of said child. The genes from the supernatural parent might result in that line being like them, or the genes might go unnoticed and dormant for several generations. Then you come along and something triggers those genes to go active. It might be anything, depending on what type of creature was your ancestor, and it might happen any time, though puberty is the most common time for it to occur. You know, with the hormones going wild and all that emotional imbalance. The older you get, the least likely it will be for you to go through a creature inheritance… unless you´re bitten by, say, a werewolf or any other creature capable of turning someone."
The last bit was clearly a jab at the fact that there is a werewolf pack in the city and Stiles couldn´t help but chuckled. "True. So you have no idea which of the possibilities will it be for you?"
"No idea, outside of the fact I have trouble sleeping," the wizard replied, then grimaced. "But knowing how crazy my luck is, it will be the creature inheritance."
"If that´s the case I can help. I helped my best friend when he became a werewolf, so I can help you with whatever you will turn into," offered Stiles.
There was a small pause before his cousin smiled at him. "Thanks, Stiles, that would be great."
"Glad to be of use. Now eat your breakfast before it gets cold," ordered the brunet firmly as he carried away his own finished plate.
"Roger, sir," the other mock saluted and obeyed him. "Any plans for the day?"
"School then a match with the lacrosse team. You?"
"Try to get some more sleep and then nothing concrete. Can I come to your match? I have never seen a lacrosse game."
"Sure. Then I can show you around the town if you want."
"Sounds like a plan."
Being on an official match was not a foreign feeling, but he had never been on a mundane one. There was never the need for that. Outside of quidditch, he wasn't much of a sports fan, but he could get used to it, for the sake of his cousin. Especially, to matches like the one he was on now. Harry stood at the stands and cheered along with the audience, as Stiles scored for his team. The wizard grinned as he could tell that his relative was very ecstatic over his success, as he recalled the brunet mentioning having little to no luck with such a thing. But now it looked like things were looking up for the teen.
Just as that thought entered the raven´s mind, a skin-crawling sensation spread through his skin and all his fighting instincts came on full alert.
Hecate damn it, thought Harry as he looked around. The young magic-user knew better than to ignore his battle-trained senses, so he had his green eyes scan the crowd, in hopes to find the source of the potential danger. They trailed from face to face, examining them, before moving on, until…
There!
Standing in the shadows of the stand was a man of old age, but Harry knew better than to let the seemingly harmless appearance deceive him. He learned that he should never trust the first impression. So he tried to keep his feelings masked by the previous enthusiasm and happiness, as he took in the older man, trying to identify just what kind of danger can he pose. The man was clearly a fighter, his stance and eyes betraying it as he observed the playground. He looked human, but that meant nothing, considering that a lot of magical creatures were human-like in appearance. And many of such creatures were a nightmare to fight and defeat, so the raven hoped he is wrong in this. The man also looked familiar in some way, although the wizard couldn´t pinpoint from where. Maybe he was one of the creatures his cousin mentioned the day before as he gave him the night before. He mentioned several of such creatures to be older than teenagers… but none of them was supposed to be this old.
What were those creatures again?
Werewolves, a banshee and a lizard man and his cousin also mentioned a certain group of humans who…
The wizard´s eyes widened as realization hit him. Suddenly he knew exactly from where was the man familiar. And it wasn´t good. The knowledge was made worse when the raven-haired wizard realized that the man´s gaze was following his cousin.
I have to get Stiles to safety and inform Noah, thought Harry with slowly growing dread.
Once the match had ended, he quickly made his way down the tribunes and tried to find his cousin, phone in hand and already dialling the sheriff´s number.
"Come on, pick up," muttered Harry impatiently.
"Hello, this is Sheriff Stilinski speaking."
"Noah, finally!" Harry let out a sigh of small relief.
"Harry?" the sheriff asked in surprise, clearly not expecting the call from the younger male. "Weren´t you supposed to be on Stiles match?"
"Yes, but the match just ended. I´m currently looking for Stiles so we can head home," the wizard said. "Where are you now?"
"I just finished my shift so I´m heading home too after I grab some things."
"Okay, but please hurry, there is something important that come up and I need to talk to both of you. As soon as possible," he added the last bit with a small grimace.
That seemed to make Noah worried. "What happened?"
"Nothing bad." Yet, he mentally added before continuing "But there is something I need to tell you and explaining it over the phone would be too complicated. It involves…" he hesitated before he added in a lowered voice "…the magical world. It is really important and I need to tell you before it is too late."
"Too late for what?"
Harry was about to reply, but just then he turned around the corner, his eyes widened at what he saw – his cousin was being pushed into a van by several men, among them the one he saw at the match. It was beyond clear the men were kidnapping his cousin, so he didn´t think twice about how to react. Besides, there were no witnesses.
"STILES!" he shouted, his new focus ring glowing on his finger with magic.
His cousin clearly heard him, because he looked back at him, but before the brunet could utter anything, he was hit in the stomach and shoved into the vehicle. The wizard wasted no more time at this, quickly casting a magical tracker spell, both on his cousin and on the van. But before he could do anything else, he was forced to jump out of the way of several bullets. Unfortunately, that gave the men all the time they needed to get into their vehicle and drive away, leading a cursing wizard behind them.
"Fucking bastards," growled Harry as the van disappeared from his sight.
"Harry! Harry! Are you here? Can you hear me?!" the raven heard coming from his phone, the call with the sheriff still going. He quickly put the phone back to his ear.
"I hear you, Noah. But I´m afraid I have bad news."
"I heard shooting and your cry! What´s going on? What´s up with my son?"
The wizard hesitated before he confessed in a small voice. "I´m sorry Noah, but… Stiles has just been kidnapped."
"W-What?!"
"I´m sorry… I… I managed to hit Stiles and their vehicle with a tracking spell, but… they started shooting… and before I knew they were… I´m sorry," he had a hard time speaking, overcome by guilt and worry. He felt like a failure for not managing to do more to save his cousin.
He must have said his thoughts out loud because the sheriff spoke: "Don´t blame yourself, kid. I doubt anybody else could do more in your situation."
"But…"
"You did what you could and that´s all that matters. Understood?"
"I… yes, sir."
"Good. Right now we have a more pressing matter to take care of. Where are you?"
"Still at Stiles´ school," Harry replied after taking a deep breath to calm himself and focus.
"Okay, so, you said you placed a tracker on my son?"
"A tracking spell."
"Yeah, how good is the spell?"
The wizard thought about it for a moment. "If I focus a little, I should be able to pinpoint Stile´s location and lead us right to him."
"Great. Now, there is what we´re going to do – You wait for me on the parking lot, I´m going to call a few of my co-workers and we´re going to save my son, alright?"
"Wait, I think it would be if you came straight her, while I called the aurors… the magical cops instead, to help us," the raven added quickly. "I think in this situation it is better."
There was a beat of silence before Noah asked "And would the magical cops come to save a mundane like my son?"
The man sounded sceptical and the teen didn´t blame him. "They would. Besides they have no choice considering who kidnapped Stiles."
That caught the man´s attention. "You know the identity of the kidnappers?"
He nodded, despite knowing the other couldn´t see it. "One of them… When I came to the states, I got an overview of the possible dangers I could come across, including a list of wanted criminals that are dangerous both to us magicals and you muggles. And Stiles… he got kidnapped by one of them."
"My god."
"That´s why I need to call the aurors. We will need the backup."
"I… I get it… You make your call. I will come soon."
"Alright, Noah. Please stay safe."
"You too, kid. You too."
When the sheriff hung up, the wizard paused. He took a deep breath to keep his courage high and dialled the number he memorised once he arrived in the US.
"Hello, this is the Emergency line of the MACUSA. How can I help you?"
"My cousin was kidnapped by Gerard Argent, a hunter wanted for mass slaughter and repeated breaking of the International Statute of Secrecy."
That was all it took for the woman on the other end of the line to take him seriously. She started asking questions and he answered all of them the best way he could. He explained which town he was in, that his cousin was mundane in the known about magic, about Noah probably wanting a part in his cousin´s rescue, and what he managed to observe from the hunters. And he also mentioned the tracking spell. The call finished with the promise of an auror team being sent to Beacon Hills.
And now we wait, thought Harry with a grimace.
Unknown to him, the magic boiling through his veins caused something to shift inside its host. But it wouldn´t be until several hours later until the young wizard finds out what exactly happened.