Chapter 1

One would often assume that a town in California is usually warm and sunny. But Beacon Hills was an exception. Especially, in January, the weather would become as cold as any other American town, except, maybe snowfall.

On one such night, when it was pouring heavily, a black Camaro could be seen driving down the road. After crossing a petrol pump, it turned and took a small road, which led to the forest surrounding the town, also known as Beacon Hills Preserve. It can certainly be said that the founders of the town had no imaginations whatsoever while naming its important landmarks. After driving several twists and turns, entering deeper and deeper into the forest, it came to a stop in front of a house.

By giving one look at the house, one could say that nobody has lived in it for at least a hundred years, although it was not that old. The house was completely charred, with broken windows and doors. Half of the roof was not even there. It stood as a relic to signify the lives lost inside it. The door of the car opened and a man, probably in his mid-20s, came out. He was quite well built with a chiselled jaw, black hair, moss green eyes, and a permanent scowl on his face. He was wearing a black leather jacket, grey shirt, and black jeans. His name was Derek Hale.

Derek took one look at the house and let out a sigh. The house had so many memories of him and his family. The Hales were an affluent and established family in the town, until 6 years back when they all perished in the fire. The only survivor that he knew about was his uncle Peter, who had been in a coma since then. The police had some suspects; however, they were all cleared of charges due to the lack of solid evidence. Since then, nobody had stepped foot in the house, except tonight.

However, he had not come here to mourn his family. He had a purpose, which was to find his elder sister Laura, who had gone missing for a week. She had shown him a report of a dear's corpse and on its body, someone had carved a spiral, the symbol of vendetta for werewolves, and had come here herself to investigate. He set out deeper into the preserve, using all his werewolf senses to find his sister.

He was trudging along a creek when he heard a wolf howling. Judging by the sound of it, he could guess it was an alpha…but it was not Laura. Which could only mean two things. The person Laura was trying to find might be an alpha, or…

No. No. No. No. It can't be. Laura can't be dead. She is alive. He kept telling this to himself. But god might not have listened to him. Because, after walking a little further, he stumbled upon something, and barely controlled himself from falling face-first on the ground. He kneeled to check the thing that he stumbled upon, and almost fell back. It was a dead body – actually half of a dead body. Its head to the torso was there, but the lower portion couldn't be found. Slowly, he turned the body, praying to the heavens that it better not be who he thinks it is. But when its face became visible to him, blood completely drained from his own face. It was none other than Laura. The werewolf had killed her, become an alpha, and now he was roaming around the town without a care in the world.

Derek could not move an inch. Every nerve of him was shaking. Laura – who had taken care of them like their mother since their family had died in the fire, who was fine and smiling just a week ago – was now no more. Her body was torn in half. The ghost of shock on her face, her mouth slightly open, her eyes bulging out, was surely going to give him nightmares for days. The air around him was suffocating and suddenly it was difficult to breathe. Slowly, he stood up shakily and took long deep breaths. Derek didn't even realize that tears had started trickling from his eyes.

Derek closed his eyes and clutched his hands at his sides to fists, trying to control his emotions. He couldn't break now. He had work to do. Firstly, he would need to move the body before the police find out. Then he would need to find the alpha and take his revenge. Only then he was going to mourn her.

Being a werewolf, it wasn't much difficult to haul up a dead body and carry it to the Hale House. He kept the body in the basement of the house and was just coming out to get into his car when his super-hearing picked up a swoosh sound. He turned his head towards that sound and squinted his eyes. It was still very far but he could still make out a snowy owl flying straight towards him. Seriously! She couldn't have come a day later? But still, he stretched his hand toward it, where the owl perched up moments later. On her beak, there was an envelope with his name on it. Derek stroked her feathers gently, and then carefully took the letter from her beak. The owl went up and perched on his shoulder, to nib at his ear which made him smile a little.

He let out a sigh after reading the letter. No there was nothing in the letter that he needed to worry about, right now. He sighed because, his mind was running through a thousand different ways on how to respond to the letter; how to explain the current situation to her, and…how would she take it. After a long time pondering over it, he decided that there was only one way; to tell the truth, as it is. She was strong enough, perhaps stronger than him, to handle this.

Already four days, along with a full moon night, had passed. So much had happened within these days that Derek couldn't even begin to think which event was more shocking. The alpha, he had investigated, had become rogue, and had bitten a boy on the same night that Derek had got to town. The boy, now newly turned werewolf, was also the beta of the mysterious alpha. This was, however, somewhat of good news to Derek, as he could be of help to track down the alpha, but first, he needed to get through his first full moon, which was two days back. And what a disaster it was! The hunters had surrounded them and had almost caught the newbie werewolf, and he could barely save him.

The newbie beta's name was Scott McCall; he had figured out his name from the records. He was quite confused and scared, and deep inside Derek had felt a little pity for him. He wanted to help him as much as possible, but he didn't know much about how to train bitten werewolves. On top of that, the Argents, their sworn enemy, had come to town with their full family, and it seemed that Scott was smitten with their daughter, Allison Argent. Overall, it was going to be very difficult to convince him to help in finding the alpha and kill him, with the Argents breathing down their necks.

But he didn't want to think about all these things at this point, as he placed his sister's body in a hole dug at the backyard of the Hale House. He figured, later, when he had calmed down enough, that Laura needed to be laid to rest, and he didn't know how long it would take to complete his vengeance. Moreover, with the cops trying to find the upper half of the body, it wouldn't be a clever idea to hide the body somewhere where its smell could reach even humans. He was, however, not alone. Standing beside him, was a girl of sixteen. She had messy black hair, which reached her waist, and bright emerald green eyes behind round-framed glasses. On her forehead, just above her right eye, there was a scar, shaped like a bolt of lightning. Behind them, not very far away, stood two more people. One was a man, in his mid-30s, with light brown and grey hair and light green eyes. He had a lot of scars on his face and wearing a robe over his shirt and pants. Beside him stood a woman of around Derek's age, who currently had short brown hair with strands of bubblegum pink here and there, and blue eyes. She was also wearing a robe over her clothing.

Although Derek couldn't see, he could feel her slightly tremble beside him, which only meant that she was sobbing silently. He didn't want this for her. She deserved happiness, she deserved everything in the world. And yet, all she is getting nowadays is more loss and grief. He wrapped his arms around her shoulder and pulled her closer. She turned around and buried her face in his neck; his shirt getting wet by her tears. After they buried her, he placed a rope covered with wolfsbane flower, surrounding the burial ground in a spiral.

He turned towards the girl and spoke, "I promise you; I won't stop until I find that alpha who killed her, and then…I'm going to make him pay for what he has done to us. He will suffer until he begs for death." He spoke the last part gritting his teeth. The girl was still staring at the burial ground. Her eyes, he noticed, were still bloodshot. After a few moments, she spoke slowly, "Is your vengeance going to bring Laura back?", she looked up at him with eyes that had lost their shine in the past few months. But still, the look was enough for Derek to gulp.

He cleared his throat, "Don't you want justice for her?"

The girl looked down and spoke quietly, and licked her lips, "I do. But…", she paused as a fresh set of tears trickled down her eyes, then spoke quietly, "This is way more dangerous…and…if something happened to you too…I…", she paused again and drew a deep breath, as her lips wobbled slightly, "I can't lose you too…You are the only family I've left."

Derek's heart clenched. He took a step forward and hugged her tightly. He kissed her forehead, and then said, "I'll be careful. You don't have to worry about it." He broke the hug and held her at arm's length, "You'll not lose me, I promise!"

The girl didn't say anything, so Derek changed the topic, "It's already too late. You must go back. Don't you have classes tomorrow?"

"I was given a week off by Dumbledore when he heard about it?"

"And how will you cover it up?"

"Hermione.", she said it like it was going to explain everything. When Derek merely arched a brow, she continued, "She promised to take notes for me. And she would help me cover everything. You know how she is."

Derek knew. She had got wonderful friends, who he knew would stick with her till the end. However, he wasn't really convinced about her staying here.

"Amara, the town is not safe now, with a rogue alpha roaming around. And you're not even of age that you can perform magic for your safety."

"That's why Dumbledore sent Moony and Dora with me with special permission from the ministry." Derek turned from her towards the two people, who nodded in agreement. The man with light brown hair spoke, "We couldn't let Prongslette come here alone and we knew that she would need some time before she is mentally ready to go to Hogwarts again."

The woman supplied, "At first it was only me who was going to come with her. But then Remus also insisted to join. And 'Mary also insisted the same."

"Don't call me 'Mary!" the girl stomped her foot when she protested. This made Derek smile a bit.

"Oh really, and what about when you call me Nymphadora just to tease me?"

"But that's your name! You call me Amara or Amaryllis, I won't mind."

"Yes, but where would be the fun in that?"

"Hmmph" the girl huffed, but then she smiled a little. The banter had surely been able to lighten the mood, for now. She then turned towards Derek and said, "We've taken a room in a nearby hotel. Why don't you stay with us? We can take another."

Derek smiled at her thoughtfulness, but he said, "I need to stay here. It is easier to track from the forest. Whoever he is, he wouldn't roam around the main town for a long time, as he can get caught. Especially with the Argents coming to town."

She stared at him for a few moments, and when Derek thought that he would need to explain more, she nodded. After all, there was no use arguing with Derek over this issue. He won't listen. She gave him another hug and whispered, "Be careful."

Derek responded, "I will" and then turned towards the other man, "Take care of her". The man nodded with determination. They broke apart and then the girl walked towards the man and the woman, and together, they left the forest.

Scott stood facing the Hale House, leaning against his best friend Stiles's blue jeep. He wouldn't say that he was not at all guilty of getting Derek arrested. After all, he had only tried to help. But just because he had become a werewolf, he couldn't live totally away from his normal life that had just now started to get a little better. He had become good in lacrosse due to his newfound superpowers and was made to play in the first line. He was dating a beautiful girl who had just now come as a new student in the school. And then suddenly, BAM! He found out that he had become a werewolf, who would have to not only have to train to find control, but he would also need to live under constant fear of the hunters, and the girl, Allison, who he was dating is their daughter. Since then, he had been panic-stricken. On top of it, Derek had threatened to kill him if he played in tonight's game, while the coach was totally against the idea of allowing him not to. He was, in a way, tied down from all the sides.

But that was not even the point. The body which they had gone to find on that fateful night when Scott was bitten; they found it buried in Derek's house's backyard. This only meant one thing – he killed the girl, tore her in half, and buried her body. He was, therefore, dangerous, and could harm anyone in the town. Scott couldn't let him do that. He needed to be arrested.

He broke out of his thoughts when he saw Sheriff Stilinski and another deputy bringing Derek out of the house handcuffed and shoved him into the police van. Before entering the van, he gave an impressive glare towards Scott, and he lowered his eyes in guilt. On the other side, two other deputies were clicking pictures of the body they dugout. Just then, he saw Stiles coming from nowhere and going towards the police van, and despite his silent protests, he still entered. Scott turned around and strained his ears to listen to what they were talking.

"Okay, just so you know I'm not afraid of you!" Stiles tried to speak in a defiant voice. But then his voice shook as he said, "Okay…maybe I am. Doesn't matter…I just wanna know something. The girl you killed…she was a werewolf. She was a different kind, wasn't she? I mean she could turn into an actual wolf. And I know Scott can't do that. Is that why you killed her?"

"Why are you so worried about me when it's your friend who is the problem?" Derek spoke in a gruff voice. "When he shifts in the field what d'you think they're gonna do? Huh? Keep cheering him on?", he continued, "I can't stop him from playing but you can. And trust me…you want to."

Stiles might have asked more questions, but just then he was yanked out from the van but Sheriff Stilinski and the father-son duo had quite a banter. But just as he was going to come back to the jeep, Scott heard another voice.

"Wait! Wait! WAIT!"

He turned to the right and saw a girl, maybe of his age, running frantically towards the police van. Behind her, he could see two more people, a man and a woman, trying to keep up with her pace.

The girl almost hovered over the police van and asked in a shaky voice, "Where are you taking him?", she made to go towards Derek but an officer stopped her.

"Miss you're not allowed to enter the police van." but she was adamant and tried to wiggle out of the police's grasp. "Where the hell are you taking him?" she almost shouted.

"He's been arrested for murder!"

"No! No way! Derek hasn't done any murder. He is innocent!"

"Miss I ask you to please step back. Whatever issues you have, you can come to the police station and we can discuss it."

"Please…please just let me talk to him once. Please."

"Miss I'm sorry I can't allow you that – "

"I'M HIS SISTER! And. I. Wish. To. Speak. To. Him. Right. Now!"

Needless to say, both Stiles and Scott were shocked as they turned to each other in question. Sister?

Sheriff Stilinski intervened at that moment. He ordered the officer to release her and then spoke to her gently.

"I'm Sheriff Stilinski. What's your name dear?"

The girl calmed down a bit and said in short, "Amara".

"And you are Derek's sister?"

Amara nodded.

Stilinski frowned for a moment and asked, "When did you come to Beacon Hills?"

"This Sunday. Why?"

"Hmm." He then turned towards the man and the woman who were behind her. "Who are they?"

"They are my guardians. I'm staying with them." Amara gave a straight answer.

"Miss we're only suspecting your brother to be the killer. We are taking him to the police station to do some questioning. If he is innocent indeed, we'll release him. You don't need to worry."

"I'm well aware of the inner workings of the system, thank you very much." She said curtly, "I just wish to speak to my brother before you take him. I don't think I'm breaking any law." She said defiantly, with her chin jutting out, crossing her arms.

Scott was actually in awe of her, of how fearlessly and confidently she was speaking to the Sheriff, in such a formal manner. She had messy black hair which was flowing against the wind. He couldn't see her face clearly, but he could figure that she had pale skin and she wore round glasses. She was wearing a pullover and jeans with a long coat over them.

Sheriff Stilinski let out a sigh and nodded, "Very well." He opened the front door of the van and motioned her to enter. He wanted to listen to their conversation too, but then, he decided otherwise. It was a private moment between two siblings and he should not listen in. After a few moments, she came out and stepped aside, giving a nod to the Sheriff. After checking everything, Stilinski entered the van along with other officers and they drove away.

Amara and her companions were still standing as if waiting for everyone to be out of earshot. Scott somehow assumed what was going to happen. Shouting and strings of curses. After all, they arrested her brother. But she needed to understand that Derek was guilty. He had killed someone. The half body was a cold hard proof of that.

She turned towards the man, who gave her a slight nod warily. Then she turned to completely face him, and Scott caught his breath.

She had a heart-shaped face, and her skin was paler than any Californian girl. Her cheeks were rose-tinted, probably due to the chilly morning weather, supported with high cheekbones, and plump pinkish-red lips, which gave her a quite uncharacteristically aristocratic look. However, the most captivating feature of her face was her eyes, which were so green that for a moment he thought they were a pair of emeralds studded on her face. Even the round-framed glasses that she wore, couldn't hide the beauty and rareness of her eyes. This, complemented with her raven-black hair which was shining due to the morning sunlight falling on it, whipping over her face due to the wind, made her look quite stunning. In fact, even when she wasn't wearing any makeup, she could definitely give Lydia a run for the money. He must never say that to Stiles, Scott decided.

Amara strode straight towards him and stopped just at an arm's distance, crossing her arms. The man and the woman had also followed her along with Stiles, who crossed them to stand beside Scott, with his hand in front of him, in a placating manner. With another gust of wind, the hair completely swept away from her face, and Scott saw an oddly shaped scar just above her right eye, almost like a bolt of lightning. But even that couldn't ruin the beauty she possessed to the slightest bit.

She cocked her head to the side, and moved her eyes up and down as if she was assessing him, then averted her eyes to his best friend and did the same thing. And then…she smiled. She actually smiled! And if Scott was honest with himself, he would have been quite fascinated with her smile, had the situation been different. At that moment…rather unnerved with her smile, which he noticed had a great touch of disdain.

"I hope you're quite pleased with yourselves," she started. The smile was constant on her face, but her eyes were cold with fury. "Creeping into our house in the middle of the night, digging our sister's body from her grave, where she was laid to rest…"

"Your sister?" Stiles interrupted.

"Our eldest sister. Laura Hale.", the smile now reduced to a small smirk, "I would really like to know how you'd feel if someone dug out one of your relatives' dead body from their grave for their experiment."

"Now wait a minute…" Scott interrupted this time haughtily, as he had seen Stiles's crestfallen face. He must be thinking about his mother. "We didn't know that she was your sister. We thought that Derek killed her and –" But before he could say anymore, he was met with an icy glare, which held such power, that it actually made him cower back, "SHUT. UP.", she hissed, raising a finger at him.

"Prongslette…", the man standing behind tried to admonish her, but she paid a deaf ear to him.

"If you were so interested in becoming Sherlock Holmes," she continued, her voice was still calm…and cold, "then shouldn't you have gotten your facts checked correctly before taking such type of action? But no, you are actually more interested in being the star player of tonight's lacrosse match. Isn't it? That's what it is all about, right?"

This was definitely not what Scott had expected from Derek's sister. If she was shouting or throwing curse words at him, it wouldn't have affected him so much. But she chose to take a different route, in which every word that she spoke were cutting through his soul, slowly crushing it. All he wanted to do right now was to dig a hole on the forest floor and crawl inside it. But he couldn't even do that, nor could he look away from her eyes for even a tiny instant. It looked as if, her enchanting green eyes had held his own in a death grip. Now, he didn't even know whether he was going to last till the end of her verbal jabs.

"So, tell me, Mr. newbie werewolf, are you confident enough to have full control while playing in the game tonight, without shifting even once, while hunters and a dangerous rogue alpha are roaming around the town?" Stiles's head snapped up in attention.

"A rogue alpha?" he inquired.

"Oh, did I forget to mention it?", Amara feigned a gasp, placing her hand over her heart, "My sincerest apologies!" Sarcasm was dripping from her voice. "Yes, it was a werewolf who killed Laura, taking her alpha status. And he was also the one who bit you." She pointed towards Scott. He was shocked at this revelation.

"So, it was not Derek who bit me?" She looked at him like he was the dumbest person in the world. And then she started laughing. Even the couple behind her had a look of amusement on their faces. She barely controlled her laughter after a few moments, taking a loud wheeze, and then wiped her tears.

"No. You dimwit." Amara confirmed. "Only an alpha has the power to create a werewolf. And if you didn't know it already, you are his beta. His subordinate. You're a part of his pack." The brownish-pink haired woman behind her supplied. Amara turned around to her and nodded.

Turning back towards Scott, she then took a step closer to him, so their faces were only inches apart. Scott caught his breath once more.

"And you know what?" her voice had dropped down to a whisper. She spoke slowly, emphasizing every word, and her voice sounded husky for some reason. Or was it his imagination?

"You are bound to him. Which means…he can make you do…anything…at his beck…and…call." Scott was unable to move or say anything at this position. She was shorter than him, and she actually had to look up while speaking to him from this distance. However, the height didn't help him much as he still didn't want to meet her eyes due to the amount of power it held, and he couldn't even look away. Her breath fanned on his lips, making them tingle, and suddenly the air surrounding them became very hot. Tiny beads of sweat had started to form on his forehead.

She drew back, and Scott released a breath that he didn't even know he was holding. She crossed her arms again, as she spoke, "So now…you both think about your current positions since you got the only person arrested who could have actually saved you from this mess." She then took another step back so that she now standing beside the man. It was then that Scott really took a look at the man. He had light-brown hair and green eyes. But not as green as the girl beside him had. And his face was covered with scars! He couldn't fathom to imagine what must have happened to him to get these many scars. The same thought was about the girl. She turned to the man, "Let's go Moony."

They turned to leave, but the man whom she addressed as Moony (A quite odd name indeed, he thought), stopped suddenly and turned around, sniffing the air. Both the boys looked at each other, confused. Was he a werewolf too? But wouldn't his scars have been healed if he was a werewolf?

Moony asked, looking directly at them, "Do any of you have wolfsbane nearby?"

At this question, Stiles started fidgeting. Scott noticed that he looked sheepish. Oh god, he didn't…Scott closed his eyes in exasperation. Stiles moved back to his jeep and took out his bag, which, on opening, revealed the rope covered with the flower of wolfsbane that they had found on the ground around the dead body. The smell of the flower was so strong that it started tingling his senses. He could feel his eyes glowing bright gold, and he was having trouble breathing. At this moment, Scott noticed that Moony's eyes glowed the colour of amber, and it looked like, he was having the same feeling as well. He took long deep breaths to calm himself and then spoke with gritted teeth.

"You know that your friend is a werewolf…" Moony started speaking in a surprisingly calm but admonishing tone, "…but still you chose to keep such a dangerous kind of wolfsbane flower near his vicinity? It has enough power to make him shift in the middle of driving. And it can also kill him if he consumes it in any form." The boys were horrified hearing this. Needless to say, Stiles immediately threw that as far away as possible.

"Dimwits…"Amara muttered under her breath.

The woman beside them, spoke now, "It's getting late. Come on. Both of you."

"One moment Dora," the girl said as she turned to face Scott again. Then she strode towards him again, while speaking, "I think…", she placed her index finger on her chin, feigning to think, "…I have forgotten something…What was it? …Um…Oh yes –"

BAM!

Crack!

He, for his life, never expected the punch coming, or he would have surely stopped it with his newfound super reflexes. The sound of it echoed to the forest. His head started spinning and there were actual stars before his eyes. Man! She had hit really hard! Slowly he opened his eyes, as the head stopped spinning, and his vision became clearer, he saw the people around him. Stiles had become open-mouthed with shock and was flailing his arms around. Moony had grabbed her by both the shoulders and was slowly scooting her away; the woman, Dora, was it, took a last look at the boys and then started to follow them. And Amara…the last thing he saw about her before she turned around as they left, were her emerald green eyes, which looked like they were blazing with fire.

It was then, that he finally felt the warm blood that was trickling down his nostrils. She broke his nose!