Author's Note: Hey guys! Okay, a couple of warnings here:
1) The entire first section of this chapter is hella NSFW.
2)That NSFW contains a bit of Dom/sub that you should all be aware of. It's not a full out scene, by any means or stretch of the imagination, and it's all entirely consensual and enthusiastically embraced, but I want to make sure you're comfortable with that before you read. (If you'd like a more thorough description, please feel free to PM me and I will be glad to help.)
3) There is a moment between Stiles and Derek where Derek puts a hand to Stiles' throat. It's not choking, but there is mild physical pressure applied, so if that makes you uncomfortable or is triggering for you, you might want to skip it.
After opening his eyes to find himself once more sprawled out in Derek's bed, knowing full well he'd fallen asleep on the couch almost as soon as he finished eating the homemade mac & cheese Boyd made for dinner, Stiles decided his boyfriend was probably the best thing to happen to him since Scott McCall shared his sandbox and a chocolate pudding cup with a four year old Stiles.
"I'm serious." Stiles argued, tucked so firmly into the gentle slope of Derek's side they were practically melded together. He wiggled his hips and tangled their legs together that much more thoroughly, practically purring with how perfectly his thigh slotted in-between Derek's. "You're perfect for me, dude. I'm ruined for life, and it's all your fault."
"Next time, I'll just leave you wherever you drop, then." Derek huffed, though he didn't bother trying to extricate himself from the jumbled mess that was their limbs. If Stiles' declaration made his stomach quiver happily, there was no one else around to take notice.
Stiles twisted his fingers in the waistband of Derek's dark blue briefs, preventing him from the escape he hadn't even attempted. "So grumpy first thing in the morning." he chided, warm, dry lips rasping the thin skin stretched over Derek's Adam's apple.
Derek swallowed back the groan in his chest, let his eyelids flutter shut as his arm tightened around Stiles' back, his fingers clenching where they rested on the slight taper of Stiles' waist. "Stiles." he warned, his voice gritty.
Stiles sighed, his exhalation dancing, humid and light across Derek's throat. "How is it possible for me to miss the feel of your hands on me this badly, when it's only been two days?" he questioned, the words breathy and deliberately low.
Derek's cock, already hard with morning wood, pulsed its interest. He ignored it, along with the equally solid jab of Stiles' erection against the top of his thigh. "You were asleep for more than half that." he reminded Stiles, instead.
Which, maybe, might have been the opposite direction Derek had been trying to encourage Stiles toward, but his mind was rapidly filling with ideas and he couldn't really be blamed for it.
Stiles smiled at the roughness in Derek's voice, the slight strain that carried over into his muscles as he struggled to reign in his body's response. "Well, I'm certainly awake now." he noted, fingers trailing slowly down the broad expanse of Derek's naked chest. "You miss it, too, don't you, Der?" His hand continued down, slipping under the sheet spread across their lower halves. He mouthed gently at Derek's jaw, his teeth scraping the hinge just to savor the hitch in Derek's lungs.
"You're injured, Stiles." Derek reminded him raggedly, tipping his head back despite himself. He knew better, he really did. Now wasn't the time to be indulging their baser instincts, allowing lust and the full moon to overwhelm the fact that Stiles was more than half-dead less than two days before.
Stiles nosed his way beneath Derek's jaw, followed the curve of it up so he could tease the shell of Derek's ear with his lips as his fingertips dipped under the band of Derek's underwear. "Doesn't even hurt."
They both knew he was lying. The scent of pain on Stiles was less potent than it had been, lighter than the night before, but it still lingered. It was, however, faint enough that if Stiles wanted to put up that particular front, Derek wasn't going to call him on it. Unless the scent spiked, in which case Derek would back off faster than Stiles could squawk out an objection.
"Derek, I swear to God, I'm okay. It's not that bad." He wasn't actually lying about that much. He still ached somewhere down deep in his marrow, but it wasn't anywhere near as bad as it had been. Breathing didn't hurt anymore, and he could push his chest into Derek's side without wincing, so really, things could be considerably worse.
Turning a little, angling his body into Stiles' at his side, Derek's hips rocked hesitantly into the cup of Stiles' hand as it closed loosely around his length. "I don't want to hurt you, or make it worse-"
"You won't." Stiles assured quickly, pulling back enough that he could look up into Derek's eyes. They were concerned, but dark all the same, pale green eaten up by deep black. "I promise, if it hurts, I'll tell you. I just... I need this, Derek. We need this."
Derek studied Stiles' face, let his ears hone in on the steady thump of his pulse. Stiles' cheeks were flushed, still wearing patches of brighter red from being pressed into Derek's chest while they slept. He looked so earnest, though, beneath the haze of lust in his eyes.
The need to be close, to feel something that wasn't pain with someone he trusted, Derek understood it. So much had gone wrong over the last few days, had thrown them into a battle none of them wanted to fight. For Derek, all he wanted to do was stay tucked away in his den with his Mate, to spread Stiles out in his bed and take him apart slowly. He figured Stiles understood that, maybe felt the same way if the hand stroking over Derek's cock was any indication. If it was what Stiles needed, if it was what Derek could give him...
"Why don't we take a shower?" he offered, dipping his head to steal a long, slow kiss, morning breath be damned.
Stiles arched a brow, but let Derek disentangle them and ease toward the opposite side of the bed. "Is this a sexy shower, or a purely-for-cleanliness shower? Because, I have to admit, I'm rooting pretty determinedly for the former."
Derek shoved his briefs down his thighs, smirking when Stiles' eyes skimmed down his body only to stop at his crotch, his mouth falling open so his tongue could flick out at his bottom lip. "Get your ass out of bed and into the bathroom, Stiles." Derek ordered, his heart flipping over in his chest when Stiles' eyes shot to his and widened, even as he rushed to comply.
It didn't take long for the bathroom to fill with steam, the shower running hot as Stiles stripped out of his underwear and tossed them toward the laundry basket without looking. He was too busy watching Derek, his eyes a heavy weight on Derek's skin while they watched as he moved around the bathroom, brushing his teeth and pulling a spare towel from a shelf behind the door.
"I don't know why you ever bother wearing clothes." Stiles said, the words garbled by the toothbrush in his mouth, an extra from the pack Derek kept in his medicine cabinet. "It should be illegal to cover all that up."
Derek grinned, coming up behind him and fitting his front to Stiles' back, dropping a kiss to his shoulder. "And yet, your father would still have to arrest me. Besides, who are you kidding? The first time you caught someone else looking, I'd have to restrain you."
"That's probably accurate." Stiles agreed after he spit and put his newly acquired toothbrush in the cup beside Derek's. He took a moment to appreciate the sight, before he allowed Derek to wind his arms around him and pull him back. Leaning into the hot wall of Derek's chest, he shuddered lightly when Derek's erection pushed in and made a home between his ass cheeks. Stiles let his head thunk down onto Derek's shoulder and his eyes slip shut. "And, while you holding me down is right at the top of my list of fantasies, I take it back. Naked!Derek is for my eyes only. Pack runs and shit not withstanding."
Derek's growl rumbled in his chest, vibrating through Stiles to settle deep in his ribcage. Stiles' skin burned hot where Derek's fingers traced the outline of silver on his belly, his nerves sparking under the hand wrapped around his ribs. Even dampened by steam from the shower, his skin was throwing off heat that felt like it should sear on contact.
"I could do that." Derek murmured into the dip of Stiles' clavicle, letting his pelvis trap Stiles between his body and the edge of the vanity, while his mouth worked leisurely at his neck. "Pin you to the mattress and fuck you through it." Stiles moaned, deep and needy, but Derek continued, his lips leaving a trail of fire as they traveled over Stiles' skin. The hand on Stiles' belly slipped lower, not close enough to touch his cock but low enough that Stiles' breath stuttered hopefully. "Hold you up against a wall, fuck you until your knees are weak and your legs are trembling."
"Derek." Stiles whined, tilting his head away so that his throat was bared to Derek's teeth.
Derek nipped sharply at Stiles' offered throat, just enough to pink the skin up. He skimmed the knuckles of his right hand down Stiles' length, his touch too light to accomplish anything other than pulling another whine from Stiles' mouth.
"Is that what you want, Stiles?" he questioned, his voice coming out as though it'd been dragged over hot coals. He lifted his left hand, banding his arm diagonally around Stiles' chest, anchoring him tightly. "Or, maybe it's what you need." His hand wrapped loosely around Stiles' throbbing cock, hot and leaking where it lanced up toward his belly. Stiles whimpered, writhed against Derek's chest and shoved his ass back to grind into Derek's lap. "I think that's it, don't you?" Derek growled, a possessive smirk twisting his lips. "Need me to make you feel grounded, anchored. You need me to cage you in, make you feel like you're not flying apart."
"Yes." Stiles bit out, sharp and desperate, like he needed it but didn't want to have to admit it out loud. He was straining into Derek's hand, hips thrusting helplessly as his cock dragged through the slowly tightening channel of Derek's fist. "Fuck, Derek, yes, okay?"
"I'll do whatever you want, Stiles, you already know that." Derek whispered, low and husky in Stiles' ear.
It was probably more of a confession than Derek really meant to give, but it didn't make the sentiment any less true. Stiles held Derek in the palm of his ridiculously attractive hands for the better part of their relationship, and they both knew it. Still, saying it out loud gave the words power; power that Derek hadn't meant to give up. The words were out there, though, and they couldn't be taken back, even if he wanted to take them. Which, oddly enough, Derek found he didn't want to do. With a shiver that tracked from his head to the soles of his feet, Derek realized that he was comfortable giving all of his power to Stiles, knowing wholeheartedly that Stiles would never, could never, use it against him.
Stiles was still fucking into Derek's fist, his cockhead slick and shiny with pre-come. "Please, Derek, please. I can't- I have to-"
"Shh." Derek hushed him gently, tightening the hand around Stiles' length while simultaneously moving his other hand up to Stiles' throat. He didn't squeeze, just fit his hand beneath the jut of Stiles' jaw and pressed in until the flesh gave under his touch. Stiles gasped, his hips jerking into a stuttered rhythm as his body bowed and his heart thundered.
"Fuck." It tore from Stiles' lips on a keening whine, high and reedy. Derek's grip was too dry, too rough on sensitive skin, but Stiles didn't care. It was good, so good, just feeling Derek's hands on him. He craved it, needed it like breathing. No matter how imperfect it was, it couldn't possibly have felt more right.
Derek growled, slid his hand higher until the tip of his thumb hooked behind the hinge of Stiles' jaw, his other four fingers digging lightly into the cords of Stiles' neck on the opposite side. "Come on, Stiles. I've got you." Derek hadn't noticed when his own hips started moving, wasn't sure when they slipped into the fractured tempo Stiles set. But, they were following Stiles' lead, his cock trapped in the cleft of Stiles' ass, the slide a little easier for the pearly wetness that dribbled from his slit and the sweat building on their skin.
The sounds spilling from Stiles' mouth were obscene, made all the more delicious for the way Derek could feel them rising up under his hand, vibrating in Stiles' throat and beneath his touch before they broke free. Derek's head was full of those decadent sounds, punctuated by the undiluted scent of Stiles' arousal, blended with his own and filling the room more densely than the steam pouring out of the shower stall.
It didn't take much more than a dozen pistons of Stiles' hips before he was coming hard, spilling over Derek's fist with a bitten off cry that warbled in his throat as his eyes rolled back. He shuddered and fell heavily back into Derek's body, trusting him to keep them both standing as he simply sagged, every ounce of energy sapped from his limbs.
"Fucking- We didn't even make it to the shower." he muttered a few minutes later, when he finally reclaimed some of his faculties.
Derek chuckled, carefully slipped his length out from between Stiles' cheeks. He was still painfully hard, hadn't gotten off when Stiles had, but he could wait. "Come on, let's get you cleaned up."
Getting Stiles into the shower was easy once Derek gave up trying to let him manage on his own; just lifted Stiles and carried him inside.
"I feel like I should object on the grounds that I am a man, damn it, and I don't need to be carried like a swooning princess." Stiles grumbled while Derek manhandled him under the shower's spray. He shivered when the hot water sluiced over his flushed skin, feeling cooler than all the steam suggested it should.
Derek held Stiles to his chest with arms around his waist, his palms spread wide and warm in the dip of his spine. "Swoon and be carried, it's the way these things work. I don't make the rules, Stiles."
"Again with the jokes." Stiles chuckled lazily, content to simply lean into Derek and let the water wash over him. No actual cleansing had to happen, not as far as he was concerned. "I didn't swoon." he added as an afterthought.
Derek snorted, earning himself a pinch of the ribs that only served to make him smile wider.
"I didn't!" Stiles protested, shoving himself away from Derek's chest, only to be caught under the elbow when he slipped and almost landed on his ass. He narrowed his eyes at a grinning Derek, feeling contrary for the sake of it. "Keep it up, fucker."
"I don't really see that being a problem." Derek mused, eyebrows going up as he looked pointedly down.
Stiles followed his gaze, mouth going dry and then watering excessively at the sight of Derek's cock, still hard and bobbing up between his thighs. "Not what I meant, but I can work with that." he muttered, tilting his head to watch as a drop of pre-come rolled down Derek's length.
"Shower first, before we run out of hot water." Derek forced himself to say, fighting to unclench his jaw as he watched Stiles' eyes darken and his tongue dart out along his bottom lip, like he wanted to taste.
It took all the willpower Derek possessed to not just pin Stiles to the shower wall and sink into him. With every brush of soapy hands over his skin, every skim of slippery fingers over corded muscle, Derek fought to keep his own touches perfunctory and mission oriented. If the occasional slip-up happened, like his fingers dipping in to glide over Stiles' puckered hole, or his hand lingering a little longer than necessary behind Stiles' balls when he was meant to be washing them, Derek was willing to chalk it up to how utterly delectable Stiles looked in his shower.
With his hair drenched and laying flat, fat droplets of water running down his body in paths Derek's tongue ached to follow, and his cock slowly filling in its nest of dark curls, Stiles was devastating.
"I think we're clean enough, Der." Stiles eventually declared, pulling Derek under the spray and watching while suds ran down his abs, between his legs and onto the shower floor. "Can I suck your cock now, or do you have a few errands you'd like to run, first?" he questioned, eyes wide with feigned innocence, fingers wrapping dexterously around the appendage in question.
Derek hissed when Stiles twisted his wrist, gave a knee-weakening jerk of his heavy cock that had Derek's head swimming. "Stiles." he breathed, having to steady himself with a palm flat against the shower tiles.
Stiles smirked, all sharp-edged and knowing. He lowered himself carefully, mindful of his newly healed skin and lack of supernatural grace. Derek watched him with hooded eyes, bottom lip caught between his teeth, chest heaving and glittering with beads of water clinging to the dark smattering of hair.
"Do you know how long I've wanted to do this?" Stiles queried from his position, on his knees between Derek's spread legs, one hand braced on Derek's muscled thigh while the other drifted slowly up toward his groin. "For years, Derek. I can't even remember the first time I imagined it, it's happened so many times since." His hand curled firmly around Derek's cock, hard and hot in his palm. Stiles gave a few leisurely tugs, satisfaction blossoming in his chest when Derek's breath stuttered. "Even sound asleep, I'd dream of what it would feel like, what your cock would taste like; how it would feel on my tongue, in my throat. I'd wake up to sticky sheets and red cheeks, because I knew I'd never get to find out."
Derek's claws threatened to unsheathe, his body vibrating with the strength exuded to hold back even a partial shift. "Thought." he corrected with a groan, looking down into liquid gold eyes. "You thought you'd never get to find out."
A wicked gleam lighting his eyes, Stiles hummed his agreement, attention falling to the rigid flesh weighing heavily in his hand. Derek expected more words, more of Stiles telling him each and every detail of his fantasized encounters with Derek's cock. Instead, what he got was Stiles' tongue flicking out to lap at his sticky head, startling a rumbling moan from somewhere so deep inside Derek, he felt it in his toes.
Stiles didn't waste much time teasing, too eager to discover how close to his imagination the real thing came. He used his fist to pull back Derek's foreskin, licking at each newly exposed stretch of skin with an eagerness that had Derek whining deep in his chest.
Stiles gave head like he did everything else; Brimming with enthusiasm and overflowing determination. He pulled Derek into his throat and swallowed around him, not even batting an eye when he choked and had to readjust. Tongue working down Derek's length like it had only one goal in mind, Stiles slurped and sucked, his eyes flicking up once in a while to read the helpless pleasure written all over Derek's slack features.
"God, Stiles." Derek panted, abs quivering with the orgasm rapidly building up and being wrenched out of him. "That mouth. Always loved your mouth." he murmured, hand sliding into Stiles' hair, molding to the curve of his skull as he rolled his hips and Stiles opened his jaw wider.
It was sinful, how good Stiles' lips felt around his cock, how perfect it felt to fuck gently into that delicious heat and have Stiles swallow around him as though he'd been doing it for ages. Derek's brain was halfway to mush, his body sparking and lighting up like a live wire with every sweet slide of Stiles' fist on him, every tantalizing glide of his lips around him.
Stile dropped one hand to his own cock, jutting up eagerly between his thighs, and began jerking himself off with quick strokes, meant to get him off as quickly as possible. Derek was right there with him, could feel his release curling up his spine like vines, twining and pulling until he was wound so tight he was sure he couldn't stop himself from simply exploding.
"Stiles-" he tried to warn, fingers twisting in silken strands to drag Stiles off.
Stiles let himself be dragged, looked up at Derek with wide, watery eyes and a puffy mouth, licking his lips like he couldn't bare to miss the taste of Derek on his tongue. His eyes were sincere and pleading when he spoke, throat roughing up the words as they spilled out. "Mark me, Derek, please." he begged, throwing his head back and exposing the long column of his throat.
The moan Derek let out at that would have been embarrassing if he could've brought himself to care. But, his eyes were flashing Blue and a snarl was twisting its way out of his throat as he stripped his cock, eyes drinking in the expanse of pale flesh just waiting for his brand. His orgasm tore through him like a freight train, loud and fast. Shoulders hunching forward, Derek shot off over Stiles' throat, coating that bobbing Adam's apple, growling his pleasure at the way his come painted messy lines that would carry his scent for hours, even when they'd been washed away.
Stiles came a moment later, Derek's come still searing his skin, branding him as taken for all the wolves to see, to smell. He let his body slump forward, catching himself on Derek's leg, head resting against his thigh while fingers pushed lovingly through his wet hair.
"See?" Stiles said, between shuddering, gasping breaths, "Ruined. For life."
Erica and Boyd sat snuggled together in one of the over-sized chairs surrounding Derek's coffee table, only looking up briefly to acknowledge them when Stiles and Derek made their way down into the living room half an hour later.
"Allison and Isaac are on their way." Boyd said, his eyes already back on Erica's phone, where she was holding it out for him to see.
"Danny, too." Erica added absently, pointing to something on the phone's screen.
Derek grunted his acknowledgment as he crossed the living room, headed for the kitchen. Meanwhile, Stiles was already perusing the bookshelf along the loft's wall, under the stairs. Derek put it in at Stiles' insistence, since most pack meetings took place at the loft anyway. It made more sense for the books to be there, organized and easily located, rather than having to trek all the way to either Deaton's clinic or Stiles' house to find whatever book they needed at any given time.
"Did they find something?" Stiles asked over his shoulder, fingertips trailing over the cracked spine of an ancient bestiary that once belonged to Derek's grandmother.
Erica huffed an annoyed breath, but Stiles knew it was at the situation and not at him. "No, not according to Isaac. I think they just want to check in."
Stiles nodded, already having resigned himself to the pack not being able to find an answer. Derek told him he was being pessimistic, but Stiles preferred to think of it as realism. Short of a miracle, he was doubtful that any of them would be able to find a cure before Carrick made a move.
Pulling down a book from the top shelf, an encyclopedia of healing magic, Stiles carried the heavy tome over to the couch and settled into its cushions, his legs folded up under him and the book spread open in his lap. It was easy to slip into the familiar routine of research, now that he was clear headed and the buzz of energy he had few ways of actually expelling had receded.
He felt better after his shower with Derek, like he was more settled, more at home in his skin. He couldn't be sure if it was the moon's influence or the effects of the metal in his blood, but he'd woken up feeling more restless and fractured than he had the day before, his brain muddled and foggy. Being near Derek helped a little, but Stiles was willing to admit, to himself at least, that Derek taking charge of him was mostly the reason he felt better.
It eased something inside, giving himself over to Derek like that. Allowing the man he loved, trusted beyond the borders of pack and loyalty, to wield power over him... It calmed him, centered him in a way he didn't want to scrutinize too closely, but was thankful for all the same.
The sounds of Derek banging around in the kitchen served to soothe Stiles further, lulling him into clear focus while he flipped through the book's pages, reading each entry at a glacial pace so as not to miss anything. He was three pages in when Derek sat down beside him, a wall of warmth at his side. It wasn't until then he realized how chilled he actually was. His blood was running a few degrees higher than normal, but his core temperature was still lower than what it should be, leaving him feeling cold when everyone else seemed to be comfortable. He leaned toward Derek reflexively, seeking out his wolfish body heat.
"Here."
Stiles looked up to see the proffered coffee cup, the orange one with the chipped rim that he'd laid claim to forever ago, held out to him by Derek.
"You're shivering." Derek noted, changing course halfway and setting their mugs down on the coffee table. He leaned over to drag his jacket off the back of the couch, draping it over Stiles' shoulders before handing him his coffee. "Drink, it'll warm you up."
"Yes, sir." Stiles said cheekily, grinning into his mug when Derek's eyes snapped to his, a slow, surprised smile curving his mouth.
Stiles went back to his reading while he sipped at his coffee, barely looking up when the others arrived. He was so immersed in an entry about a cleansing ritual that he didn't notice when Allison sat beside him, tucking her knees into his side and laying her head on his shoulder.
"We'll find something." she whispered, slipping her fingers into his hand and squeezing. "We've got a great track record of figuring this stuff out at the last possible second."
Stiles chuckled lowly, leaning forward to set down his mug. "Yeah, I guess we do." he agreed, smiling softly when Allison rested her head back on his shoulder the second he settled back into the couch. "I just... I hate this, you know? Not being able to feel such a huge part of myself."
Erica snickered, a lecherous grin tugging at her lips.
"Pervert." Stiles chided fondly, unable to wipe away his own smile.
"You know it, baby." Erica shrugged, kicking her heels up onto the table, having sunk into the space created when Boyd got up to join Isaac and Danny in the kitchen.
"Allison's right," Derek tossed in, elbowing Stiles lightly in the side, "we're going to figure all of this out. We'll find a way to reconnect you and Isaac with your wolves."
"What about Carrick? What are we-" Stiles started, only to cut himself off with a confused noise when he shoved his hand into the pocket of Derek's jacket and felt something inside. "What's this?" he asked, pulling out the velvety bundle.
"Oh," Derek's brow furrowed, looking at the bag. "Remember that Faerie we talked to, the night that Scott called us out to Winslow Lake?"
Stiles nodded. "I don't think encounters with Faerie princes are something you really forget. Especially when said prince is six inches tall and completely naked."
A few titters of laughter filled the room at that, mostly from Erica, though Stiles could feel Allison's giggles against his side.
"Yeah, well, Boyd and I ran into him the day you were shot." Derek told him, jaw going tight with the memory. Stiles wrapped his free hand around Derek's forearm in silent reassurance. "He said to give that to you, that you'd know what it was for. But, by the time we got to you..."
"I was already hit." Stiles filled in, hating the pain that bled into Derek's voice.
"Boyd had it, and I forgot about it until last night, but you were asleep when I got home." Derek explained, scrubbing a hand across the sharp edge of his stubbled jaw. "Do you know what it is?"
Stiles shook his head as he eyed the bag speculatively, weighing it in his hand and letting the hum of magic in its fibers crawl across his skin. "Did you open it?" he asked, squinting to read the golden markings embossed in its green velvet fabric.
"Hell no." Boyd shouted back, raising his voice so Stiles and Allison could hear. "I leave any and all magic related shit to you and Lydia."
"Good call." Stiles called back, nodding absently.
"What do you think it is?" Allison asked, bending forward to get a better look.
"I'm not sure." Stiles frowned, tracing a line of stitching. "But, I'm pretty sure these markings are written in Fae."
"They have their own language?" Isaac asked as he entered the room, perching on the arm of the couch beside Allison, a cup of coffee in one hand and a couple of toaster waffles in the other. Danny was right behind him, coffee in hand as he lowered himself into an empty chair beside Erica.
"Sort of?" Stiles replied distractedly, busy trying to decipher the markings. "It's mostly made up of word fragments and something like hieroglyphs. At least, their written language is. Spoken language is a whole other situation."
"Can you read it?" Danny questioned, watching as Stiles concentrated on the bag.
"Maybe." Stiles hummed, putting aside the book in his lap and pushing himself up to cross the room. He ran his finger along the edge of the bookshelf, searching for a book he and Lydia had compiled, a collection of rare languages they'd written mostly for fun during the sporadic lulls in supernatural activity.
Setting down the book on the coffee table, Stiles flipped it open and began leafing through its pages.
"Just open it." Erica suggested, clearly impatient to find out its contents.
Stiles and Derek both let out snorts that told her exactly how awful an idea that was. "How about no?" Stiles offered snarkily. "We don't know what's in here. It could be poisonous to werewolves, or even humans. Hell, it could pull an Indiana Jones and melt all of our faces off."
"You watch too much TV." Boyd told him, coming in and sitting on the floor by Erica's feet, offering up a cup of coffee to her while he sipped from his own.
"Prince said it was supposed to help, I think." Derek muttered, trying to remember exactly what the faerie had said. "Something about needing whatever is in there for the pack to survive the month."
"Did he say anything else?" Stiles asked, searching around the room for a pen and paper, grinning his thanks when Derek handed it to him from the drawer in the end stand on his side of the couch.
"Just that he was paying back a debt to Scott, and that you and I make a curious pair."
"Isn't that the truth." Isaac mumbled under his breath, smiling blindingly when Derek and Stiles both fixed him with bored glares.
"I'm pretty sure he likes us." Stiles mumbled, mind racing off in a thousand different directions. "That first night, out by the lake, he asked if you were mine. He seemed fascinated by the idea, like it pleased him."
"Yeah, I got that, too." Derek agreed.
"Because that's not creepy at all." Allison scoffed, frowning at the bag.
"He did say that he would be 'displeased by your loss'." Boyd added, earning a nod of thanks from Derek for reminding him.
Stiles paused in his hurried translating, dropping his pen to focus his attention back on the bag. "So, whatever is in here is meant to help us, but we don't know how. The Fae are tricksters by nature. Their idea of helping isn't always going to jive with ours."
"Did you get anything from the markings?" Derek asked, leaning forward to get a look at the notebook when Stiles had been silent for a few long minutes.
"There are the things you'd expect, like healing and purification." Stiles sighed, rubbing at his eyes. "I'm almost positive there's something about a phoenix, though, which probably doesn't bode well for Parrish. But, what really worries me is the bit about a blood sacrifice. It's not specific, from what I can tell, but it's there. This symbol references smelting, which is not a term I want used in reference to me in any scenario. I mean, would I be the metal or the ore in that situation? Because, either way sounds disturbingly painful." Stiles shook his head, reordering his thoughts and putting himself back on track. "I'm not confident in any of this, though, honestly. I could be reading the ingredients for laundry detergent, for all I know." Stiles' mouth turned down sharply at the corners.
"I didn't understand half of what you just said." Isaac admitted, looking at Stiles for an explanation.
"Allison makes her own silver arrowheads, Isaac. You have to at least know what smelting is." Derek pointed out, before giving his attention back to Stiles. "So, this might be a cure?"
"It could be." Stiles allowed, grimacing. "Or, maybe it will kill all of us the moment I open it. I know we're fond of the blind leap around here, but I'd really rather not be responsible for anyone else getting hurt. Somehow, the term 'blood sacrifice' just doesn't conjure images of sunshine and rainbows, you know?"
"Okay." Derek conceded, taking a deep breath before forcing it out between clenched teeth. "So, we call Lydia. Between the two of you, you should be able to translate enough to figure out what we're dealing with. No one does anything until we know for sure, one way or the other?"
Stiles hesitated, chewing his lips while he turned the bag over in his hands. "Okay." he eventually agreed, albeit grudgingly. If he was holding the cure in his palms, if the little green bag in his clutches was the thing that would get him his wolf and his Mate bond back, he didn't want to wait or play it safe. He knew better, though, had learned from rash decisions and gut reactions. With a sigh and one last, longing look at the bag, Stiles nodded. "Let's call Lydia."