Author's notes- So I hope you guys liked the last chapter. I'm really enjoying writing this story. I'm also loving Season 3B of Teen Wolf right now. Shit's getting crazy!

Chapter Four:

Druids

Steel to my trembling lips.

How did the night ever get like this?

One shot and the whiskey goes down, down, down.

Bottom of the bottle hits

waking up my mind as I throw a fit.

The breakin' is takin me down, down, down.

My foot tapped to the beat on the carpeted floor as Adam Lambert's vocals flowed from my earbuds and into my head. I checked my phone for the fourth time that morning.

"It's been twenty minutes. There isn't even a lot of people in here," I thought irritably.

Mom and I were currently in the adoption agency in San Pedro. Today, I would be finding out who my birth parents are, or, were. Sitting with us in the waiting room were a couple that looked like they were in their twenties and a mother with what looked like a five year old girl. Why were these people taking this long.

"Are you nervous?" Mom asked noticing that my other leg was fidgeting non-stop. A old habit when I would get anxious about something.

"I don't know," I admitted as I stilled my leg with my hand on my knee. I was curious and excited to find out, but a small part of me was scared. If my parents had died, had it been a gruesome death? If they were still alive, why had they given me up? If I attempted to contact them, would they even want to talk with me?

My whole body jumped slightly as Mom rested her hand on top of mine. "Natalie, no matter what happens, you know that Scott and I are here for you, right?"

"Yeah... yeah, I know."

She nodded and took her hand away just as a young redheaded woman came into the waiting room.

"Natalie McCaull?"

Sharing a glance with Mom, we both stood up and followed the woman down the hallway. She led us down a few turns until we came to a door. The plaque on the door read:

Ryan Kane

Social Worker

The woman knocked on the door before entering. Sitting at the desk was a man who looked to be thirty years old. His strawberry blonde hair was slicked back and came just below the back of his ears. He wore a simple white button down shirt with the sleeves rolled up along with a blue tie. He raised his eyes from the paperwork on his desk showing steel gray eyes.

"Your four o' clock appointment is here, Mr. Kane," the redhead announced before ushering us inside.

A wide grin broke over the man's face. "Natalie! So good to see you!" he exclaimed as he clasped my hand in a firm handshake. "Last time I saw you were a just a cute little nugget."

"Uhm, thanks. I guess," I answered slightly uncomfortable. I took my seat in one of the cushioned chairs across from his desk.

"How are you today, Natalie?"

"Good. A little nervous, but good."

"Perfectly normal," Ryan reassured me. He stood up from his desk and walked over to a file cabinet on the other side of his office. Pulling out the drawer he went through it before pulling out a manila envelope. He placed it on the desk in front of him.

"This file contains your birth certificate along with a few photos that the agency thought that you would want." he explained before sliding it over to me.

I carefully picked up the file forcing my fingers to stop trembling. I layed out the birth certificate out in front of Mom and I. My eyes looked over it until I found what I was looking for.

Natalie Diana Collins

Born on: December 5, 1995 at 5:00 PM

8 lbs, 10 oz.

"Collins? Is that Irish?"

"Yes," Ryan answered. "Turns out that your family has been in the liquor business for many years, so their name is pretty well known."

"So, they're wealthy?"

"Not extremely, but pretty well off."

I bent my head back over the document searching for my parent's names. I found them a few minutes later.

Father:

Jason Patrick Collins

Mother:

Kendra Rose Collins

Ryan had taken the manila folder back as I was looking at the certificate. From the file he took out two photos and a small object wrapped in brown paper.

"Normally, the agency will keep photos of family, but they felt that you should keep these," he told us before handing the photos over to me.

The first one was my parents' wedding photo. I felt like I was staring back at my own reflection when I saw my mother. I had inherited her facial features along with her dark blue eyes. Her hair, however, was the lightest shade of blonde I had ever seen.

My eyes went over to my father, who's hair color matched mine. His smile looked so happy as they both looked into the camera. I felt my chest tightening slightly, but pushed it away and picked up the second picture.

Mom was in a hospital bed smiling at the camera with a small baby in her arms. Dad was crouching next to the bed with his arm around her and a goofy smile on his face. "Welcome, Baby Natalie!" was written on the back of the photo.

Ryan cleared his throat making me look up from the photo. "Before we go any further, I need to know if you want to hear this, Natalie. You can always say no."

It was at that moment when I noticed my eyes were pricking with wetness. "No, I'm fine. I want to hear this," I replied while blinking away tears.

Ryan nodded his head before continuing. "Before you were born, your parents actually lived in Beacon Hills. They had gone to High School together, which is when they started dating. You came along a few years later and they moved just outside of San Francisco."

"That's where Allison is from," I thought to myself.

"There had been reports of animal attacks going around the town, but it was only happening to pets around the neighborhoods. So people weren't exactly worried about it attacking people."

I felt Mom's hand close over mine.

"There was a call from a neighbor that the animal had broken into one of the houses. By the time the police got there, it was gone. Your parents..." he paused for a minute to wipe his eyes. "Your poor parents had been killed in the attack."

The silence that filled the office was almost deafening.

"...Did they find out what animal it was?" I asked after a few minutes.

"I'm getting to that. One of the police officers went to search the house. She found you, a little one-year-old baby, laying on the floor of your bedroom. You were screaming and crying with what looked like a huge bite in your side."

I thought I was going to lose my lunch right then and there, but I forced myself to keep listening.

"They got you to the hospital where they did some tests and patched you up. The results came back as a wolf bite."

"There aren't any wolves in California," Mom piped up for the first time during the meeting.

"Yes, it came as a shock to us as well," Ryan agreed. "The doctors thought that maybe it had been traveling and had wandered in from another state. But what was most interesting was that even though you had been bitten by a wild animal, the would didn't appear to contain rabies. How odd is that?"

"Very," I agreed.

"I'm surprised at how well you're taking this," Ryan commented raising an eyebrow.

"Sorry, I'm usually the kind of person who tends to keep it all inside."

The man stared at me for a few moments longer before diverting his eyes to the last object on his desk.

"Your parents' will was read a few months after their death. Since you were only a baby, the inheritance stayed with you father's parents. But, they did allow me to give you one thing of your mother's," he slid the wrapped item over to me.

The object turned out to be a necklace. A silver circle hung on the chain. A three-spiral symbol took up the inside of the circle. I had seen this exact symbol in my text book at school.

"This is a Druid symbol, isn't it?" I asked.

"You know about it?"

"The Druids were magicians in ancient Celtic religion," I explained as a turned the necklace around in my fingers. "This was their symbol. We're learning about the Celtic religion in my History class right now."

Ryan blinked surprised of my vast knowledge before continuing. "I was told that this necklace was given to your mother by a close friend. Can't exactly remember who, but your grandparents figured that you would want to have it."

1 Hour Later

After dropping Mom off at the hospital for her shift, I started driving home. I had taken the day off from school to go to the agency, so Scott would be getting out of school now.

I traced my finger over one of the spirals on my mother's necklace which I was currently wearing. This day had been physically and mentally draining. But, now I knew the truth about me becoming a werewolf. One question kept going through my mind. Why had that werewolf killed my parents, but had spared my life?

I was taken out of my thoughts as my phone started ringing. I raised my eyebrow when I saw Stiles' name on my screen.

"Hello?"

"Derek is dying!" came his yell from over the phone.

"Why are you with Derek? Isn't he supposed to be in jail for murdering that girl?"

"Turns out that it actually was an animal attack, so he's out," Stiles explained. I heard a faint moaning in the background.

"Okay, so what is this about him dying?"

The sound of the phone getting yanked out of Stiles' hand sounded over the speakers.

"Someone...shot me with a different kind of... bullet," Derek's voice sounded over the other end. His breathing sounded labored and it was hard to hear him. "It was poisoned... or something."

A light bulb suddenly went off in my head. "Wait, was it a wolfsbane bullet?"

"How do you know about wolfsbane bullets?" the older werewolf's voice was dripping with suspicion.

"Wait, where's Scott right now?" I asked.

"He went over to Allison's house. He's going to try to find the bullet," Stiled answered after getting his phone back.

"Allison is a hunter?"

"Her family is," Derek's voice came faintly.

"Tell him to find out what bullet they used and get his ass out of there. Stiles, I need you to take Derek to Scott's work and I'll meet you there."

"Why? What can you do? If you touch wolfsbane, you're going to die!"

"Don't worry about that. Just text me when Scott has the name," I ordered before hanging up. I turned into a random person's driveway, turned around, and headed back down the way I came. I went through the contacts on my phone as fast as I could before finding who I was looking for. There were two rings from the other end before a tired female voice answered.

"Hello?"

"Lucy, it's Natalie."

"Hey hoe, what's up," my friend's voice brightened immediately.

"We have a wolfsbane emergency."

"Oh Christ, Nat. Don't tell me you got infected."

"No, not me. One of my... acquaintances," I muttered trying to think of the appropriate word for the relationship between Derek and I. If you could even call it that. "Someone shot him with a wolfsbane bullet and apparently it's pretty bad."

"Well, do you know what kind of wolfsbane it was?" Lucy asked. I could hear drawers opening and her hand sifting through things in the background.

"Scott is finding that out now, but I'm heading to your house now. We need to get to the vet's office."

"Okay, I'll be ready."

Lucy Brookes was a good friend of mine from when we were kids. She was two years older than me and already out of High School, but she was living in an apartment by herself in Beacon Hills. Lucy turned out to come from a family of hunters like Allison supposedly did, but after deciding to reveal my powers to her when we were ten changed her mind about the werewolves. After graduating High School she left the family business and got an apartment with her boyfriend of three years named Tyler. Luckily, she always kept a stash of wolfbane with her just in case I got into little scraps like this.

I arrived at her door five minutes later knocking a mile a minute.

"I hear you, I hear you!" she exclaimed irritably as she opened the door. Lucy was a tiny girl with a naturally petite body that any model would kill for. She was a couple of inches taller than me (I was 5'6) with dark red hair that was cut short in a Pixy cut. Her light brown eyes were shadowed slightly in exhaustion, but if she was tired the rest of her didn't show it.

"Has Scott found out the type yet?" she asked as I followed her into the kitchen. Scattered on the countertop of the island was several plastic bags of wolfsbane and a few wooden boxes. What they had in them, I wasn't sure.

I covered my nose and shook my head as my eyes turned purple momentarily. "Jesus! Are you trying to kill me?"

"I literally just got all of this out when you knocked on the door, so don't get sassy with me," Lucy retorted as she cleared the island off and organized it neatly away from me.

My phone vibrated with a text from Scott. "What's Nordic Blue Monkshood?"

"That stuff? Damn, these hunters have expensive tastes," she commented before picking up one of the wooden boxes. Snapping the clasp and opening it revealed three rows of silver bullets.

"By the way, how did Tyler not notice your little "drug ring" going on here?" I asked throwing my coat back on.

"He's at work right now. Besides, he never looks in the cabinet where I keep these. He thinks it's full of tampon boxes and other "femininities"", she replied with air quotes. I sent a text to Scott telling him that I got the bullet before we headed out of the apartment.

We arrived at Scott's work a few minutes later parking next to Stiles' jeep. As soon as we got inside, I knew something was wrong. I could smell the scent of burning flesh and what sounded like a saw was coming from the back room. I opened the door and was met with the sight of a shirtless Derek hanging halfway off the examination table and Stiles bringing a handsaw dangerously close to cutting off his arm.

"STILES, WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING!"

The brunette immediately stopped the saw and his head snapped up. A look of total relief came over his face when he saw Lucy and I standing in the doorway.

"Oh, thank God. You just prevented a whole lot of nightmares," he sighed.

Lucy muscled her way past me and set down her supplies on one of the counter tops. Stiles and I helped Derek to stand back on his feet. I now could see the extent of the wound. A bullet was wedged between his lower arm and his elbow. Red veins had spread across his skin from his shoulder all the way down to his wrist. The scent of rotting flesh that I had smelled when I had first entered the clinic now flooded my senses with its putrid scent.

"Give me the bullet," the older werewolf rasped holding his palm out. Lucy quickly took one out of the box and handed it over to him.

"What are you going to do with it?" Stiles asked eyeing the pointed bullet curiously.

"I'm gonna..." Derek began to answer, but his eyes rolled into the back of his head before he fell to the floor unconscious. Lucy caught the bullet before it could role off somewhere as Stiles took Derek's face in his hands.

"He's not moving. Natalie, I think he's dead!"

The bell on the front door to the clinic rang as someone entered to building. I sprinted out of the back room and saw Scott standing at the door.

"Where's Derek? Is he okay?"

The sound of first connecting with face was heard in the back room followed by a cry of pain form Stiles. My brother and I ran back inn to see Derek still on the floor and looking like death, but he was conscience and blinking his eyes. My question of how he was awake was answered as I saw Stiles shaking out his hand.

"Get him up now! I have it almost ready!" Lucy ordered when she saw Scott and I standing there like idiots. We both grabbed Derek's wrists and hauled him up as Lucy took out her lighter and lit the wolfsbane that she had knocked out of the bullet. When the sparks died down, she scooped the pile of ashes into her hand and brought it over to us. With a weak nod from Derek, the redhead took the ashes and pressed it into the wound.

A roar of pain exploded from Derek's throat as the older man fell back onto the floor bringing me with him. Lucy had lost her grip on his arm when he fell, so I rubbed the rest of the ashes into Derek's wound. His canines grew longer and his green irises turned to bright blue as he let out another wail of pain. I watched as the red veins slowly receded until the bullet fell out of his skin.

The next few minutes were filled with the sound of all of us breathing. It was shattered seconds later when Stiles exclaimed, "That. Was. AWESOME!"

I released the breath that I hadn't realized I had been holding. That's when I noticed that my hand was in Derek's with our fingers intertwined. How they had got there, I wasn't sure. I felt the werewolf's gaze on our fingers before he frowned deeply and turned his head to me.

"Why the hell did you bring a hunter here!"

"Ex-hunter," Lucy corrected before I could defend her. "Is that the thanks I get for saving your little werewolf ass?"

I quickly let go of Derek's hand feeling my face burn with embarrassment. He slowly got to his feet and looked at his now healed arm.

"Are you okay?" Scott asked from his position next to Stiles.

"Beside the agonizing pain, yeah," he retorted.

"I see that it didn't kill your sense of sarcasm," Stiles commented. He quickly shut his mouth when Derek shot him a death glare.

I offered to drive Derek home since Lucy had to get home to make dinner for her Tyler and the boys had homework to do. The car ride was pretty much silent except for the directions that Derek would tell me to get to his house. I was shocked at what I saw when I brought my car to a stop in the woods. In the middle of the clearing stood the remains of the Hale house. It looked like an empty husk. Cold and empty.

The older werewolf muttered a thank you before reaching his hand forward to open the door.

"Wait."

He paused with his hand on the handle and turned his head toward me.

"I know that Scott thinks that you're the one that bit him... but, I know that you didn't."

He stared at me for a few minutes. "How do you know."

"I did some research on werewolves in the past. A natural-born or a bitten werewolf's eyes are golden. I saw that your eyes turn light blue, but I'm not exactly sure what that means yet. The only one who can turn someone into a werewolf is the Alpha. Their eyes are blood red. So, you obviously couldn't have turned him," I explained.

The next few seconds of silence started to unnerve me. Had I offended him? Just when I was about to turn my head away he finally answered, "Your eyes turn purple."

I glanced into my mirror to see that my irises had indeed turned their unusual shade of lavender.

"You're right. I'm not like you."

Post notes- I'm really not proud of the first half of this chapter. My knowledge of adoption only goes so far lol. Make sure to review and I'll see you in the next chapter!