Chapter Text
They slowly made their way back up to the castle once Argent returned with what looked like most of the blankets they owned. They covered Scott as carefully as they could and Derek carried him gingerly, Stiles with Connor, and Lydia, who Argent was watching closely, following close behind. At which point Derek declared that Newark smelled like death.
Argent opened his mouth to explain but caught a sharp look from Stiles. So he refrained.
Predicting that his Alpha would find out soon enough on his own, the Beta carried Scott down to a cell, tended to his burns with what little first aid supplies they had on hand, and put him in a cell with Ethan, as the best of a lot of bad options.
Upstairs it was decided that Lydia should also be locked up.
“Put her into the one next to the queen and Liam,” suggested Stiles snidely to his confused husband. “That’ll be an interesting conversation come nightfall.”
“Queen? What queen?”
Stiles contemplated letting Liam out—after all, he hadn’t done anything wrong—but from previous experience, he saw no reason that having to look after him would improve matters. Liam was chaotic at the best of times. Plus, he suspected the best thing at the moment would be some time with his mother.
“But I just saved one of your pack!” protested Lydia.
“And I’m very grateful, Lyds.” Stiles would give credit where it was due. “However, you also tore through New York with a giant tank and did a lot of damage. You may have even killed people. I’m not really sure.”
The redhead rolled her eyes in disgust.
“At least this way you are near your son. He was very upset,” yelled Stiles as his husband hauled the struggling scientist away.
Which was when Derek discovered the reason behind the smell. He had a hive of vampires in his castle.
He came storming back up stairs. “Stiles!”
Stiles had vanished.
“He’s gone upstairs. To your room,” said one of the clavigers helpfully.
“Of course he has.”
Derek stomped upstairs to find Stiles sprawled out on their bed, having already tucked Connor into bed in his own room. It had been a long night.
“There are vampires in my dungeon!”
“Well, where else was I supposed to put them?”
“The queen swarmed? And you invited them in? Here?”
Stiles shrugged.
“Great. Fantastic,” Derek almost spat out.
Stiles sighed, a sad, quiet noise that calmed Derek where his yelling would have only aggravated matters. “I can explain,” Stiles said from behind a yawn.
Derek climbed into the bed next to his husband, his anger dissipated by Stiles’s uncharacteristic meekness. Stiles must be very tired.
Stiles relayed the events of the night, and by the time he reached the concluding pack-versus-tank battle, he was yawning loudly.
“What are we going to do now?” wondered his husband. Even saying it, Stiles could tell from his defeated expression that he was already facing up to the truth—for better or worse. Newark Castle now belonged to the Manhattan Hive. Or rather, the Newark Hive.
Stiles grabbed his hand tenderly. He hadn’t meant to make such a mistake, but the deed was done.
Derek sighed. “I rather liked this old place. But it hasn’t been my home all that long. I can break from it. The rest of the pack are going to be difficult. I haven’t served them very well the past few months.”
Stiles squeezed his hand. “It’s not your fault. I’ll think of something.” Stiles wanted to find a solution right then and there just to wipe the expression of guilt and disappointment off his husband’s face, but he could hardly keep his eyes open.
Derek bent and pressed his lips to Stiles’s forehead. Stiles suspected he was contemplating going back downstairs to check in with Argent, as there was still a lot to be done.
“Come to bed.”
“Perhaps just a little nap.”
“Argent has Boyd downstairs helping him. They could run the country, I think, if they felt like it.”
Derek chuckled and crawled under the covers.
--
“Sorry to disturb you, but the vampires are asking for you.” Argent’s voice was quiet and apologetic.
Stiles came awake with a start to the feel of his husband shifting beside him. Derek was evidently trying to extract himself from the bed without disturbing him.
“What time is it, Chris?”
“Just after sunset. I thought it best to let you sleep the rest of the day.”
“Really? And have you slept?”
Silence met that.
“Right. Tell me what’s going on and then you go get some sleep.”
Stiles heard a faint howling. The younger werewolves, still unable to control change so close to full moon, were changed again and imprisoned below for another night. Locked away with vampires.
“Who is with them?” asked Derek as he, too, registered the sound.
“Jackson.”
“Oh, crap.” All subtlety abandoned, Derek jumped out of bed.
“Yes. And what are we going to do about the vampires? We can’t keep them locked up.”
Derek sighed. “It’s not them we have to find what to do with—it’s us. We can’t stay living here, not with a hive and they can’t leave. When you invited her in, Stiles—“ Derek turned to look at Stiles who stopped pretending to be asleep “—you gave them Newark.”
“Really?”
Argent sat down in a nearby chair. Stiles had never seen him look defeated before, but at that moment, he looked as close to crushed as he’d ever seen.
Derek looked grim. “We’ll have to move the pack permanently to New York.”
Argent did not look happy. “The pack is not going to like this.”
“I have made my decision,” said his Alpha.
“The queen is not going to like this.”
“That will be too bad.”
“I think it’s a very good idea,” said Morrell, entering the room at that moment, followed by Liam and Lydia.
Well, Stiles supposed, it’s her room now.
“How did you three get out?” griped Argent.
The queen glared. “Did you think I was queen of the vampires for nothing? We are the original inventors of the idea of a mistress of the domain. This is now my domain. No cell in all of Newark will hold me for long.”
Lydia rolled her eyes. “Whatever. She can pick locks.”
“It was fantastic,” added Liam, who seemed to be regarding Morrell with real respect for the first time.
“Anyway, Newark is ours now.”
Derek did not protest her claim. “We’ll need a few days. The younger members of the pack can’t be moved until the moon fades.”
“Take all the time you need,” said the vampire queen. “But the spark and his child must be out tonight. I won’t have them in my house.” She twirled toward the door dramatically and then paused on the threshold. “And the boy is mine.”
With that, she swept out, presumably to release the rest of her hive. “Oh,” Stiles heard her say to no one in particular as she walked down the stairs, “everything will have to be redecorated!”
Lydia stayed behind. She looked tired. Liam was practically stuck to her side.
“You can’t let her take him away from me.” The inventor appealed to the assembled government officials with anguished eyes. “Please.”
Stiles’s subconscious had apparently given this some thought while he slept, because a solution occurred to him. “Speaking as shah, there’s not actually anything you can do – legally – to remove him. If Allison’s will is what you say it was and you never actually adopted him, than her claim is valid.”
Lydia nodded morosely.
“But – as long as nobody last night actually did get hurt – we can give you to Morrell.”
“What!?”
“It’s really the only way. As long as all the destruction was confined to supernatural property or supernatural persons, this won’t be sent to a normal court. Any charges will end up in front of the Shadow Council and the hives and packs anyway. Liam is what, ten? So, with Morrell’s approval—and I doubt she’ll object—you can be a drone to the Manhattan Hive for the next eight years. Or, I should say, the Newark Hive. Given your hatred for the hive, it’s actually a punishment for you, so I doubt Peter or Laura will object and you get to stay with Liam. Call it community service or whatever.”
Derek actually looked proud at Stiles’s plan. If Lydia weren’t freaking out, he would have shot his husband a glare. Really. He was fantastic at coming up with solutions.
“This is a terrible idea!”
“Can you think of something better? The only other solution will probably be jail and then you won’t see Liam at all.”
“But I hate Morrell.”
“I suspect so does most of her drones and some of her vampires.”
“Do you really think the queen will go along with it?” Lydia sighed.
Stiles shrugged. “Why wouldn’t she? She gets your inventions and patents for the next eight years. Liam stays with you both. The only problem is going to be if you caused any injury to non-supes.”
Lydia shook her head. “No, I watched out. I only destroyed the hive house and I think a car when I first got it up and running. I hit a wrong button on the flame arm. All my attacks were directed at the hive, though. Any injury would be to just drones and vampires. Maybe some of your wolves.”
Stiles nodded. “Yes, well, the car was mine, thank you. But as long as there wasn’t any non-supe damage we can keep it to the Shadow Council.”
Lydia seemed to resign herself to the plan, but then started. “Wait. What about my shoe shop?”
“Well, I thought we might convert your lab into a dungeon for the pack. It’s underground and secure.”
Derek nodded. “It’s a good place. I bet it’s soundproofed too.”
Lydia nodded. “But will I have to close it? I actually like designing shoes in my spare time.”
Stiles rolled his eyes, but Derek looked like he had an idea. “What about Scott?”
“Scott? Selling shoes?” Stiles looked at his husband incredulously.
“He lived with Laura for years. He has to know something about shoes. And you said he needed something to do. Some kind of employment.”
Stiles looked at his husband thoughtfully. “You know, I bet you’d get a lot more customers if Scott was running it. Girls literally swoon over him. Something about the crooked jaw, I think.”
Lydia rolled her eyes. “Yes, I guess that will work. He probably can’t mess it up too badly.”
--
It took another week for the newly christened Manhattan Pack to officially move in. Stiles had spent the week with his son, for once feeling like he was starting to understand the whole father thing. Possibly it had to do with carrying Connor around for an entire night, fighting off a flame-throwing tank and wayward werewolves. Derek didn’t stay there at all that week, though, so when Stiles heard that the pack would be officially moved in – and therefore Derek would be home for good – Stiles practically begged Laura to watch Connor for the night.
“Come on? Please?”
“Yes, yes. Go do terrible things to my brother. I don’t want to hear anything else about it, though.”
Stiles rolled his eyes.
When Derek walked into their shared room while Stiles was trying to button up a shirt, he immediately crowded Stiles, wrapping his arms around Stiles’s shoulder from behind and burying his face in Stiles’s neck.
“Mmm, hello Derek. I got Laura to watch Connor tonight. I thought we could go to dinner or catch a movie or some—“ he got cut off by Derek spinning him around and kissing him soundly.
When he pulled back for air, Stiles started trying again to button up his shirt. Derek kept interfering.
“No, stop it. I thought we could go out.”
“I don’t want to go out. I want to stay in.”
Stiles tried to respond, but Derek had already divested him of the shirt he’d given up on trying to button and was moving on to his belt. Stiles really couldn’t find it in himself to care that much.
“Did you lock the door?”
Stiles could feel Derek shrug and so he moved them that way, never breaking contact, so that he could turn the lock.
“Don’t need any interruptions. It’s been too long.” Stiles grinned wickedly.
Derek, even turned mortal at Stiles’s touch, could still lift Stiles easily. He hoisted him there, and pushed him flush against the wall, kissing him hard. Stiles wrapped his legs around Derek’s waist and grabbed his shirt, trying to pull him even closer.
Suddenly there was a banging on the wall and they could hear a faint voice from outside - Laura.
“I know what you’re doing in there and you will not do it on my wall! That’s expensive wall paper! Use the bed like normal people!”
Derek flushed, his ears turning pink, but Stiles just dropped to his feet and drug Derek over to the bed to continue.
Later, as Stiles lay wrapped around Derek, he lay his head on Derek’s chest.
Without looking up, he said, “I’m sorry it took me so long to, you know. . .” He trailed off.
Derek turned Stiles’s chin upwards. “It’s not your fault. It’s all my fault. I know I can’t say it enough, but I’m sorry. I never should have given you a reason not to trust me and I’ll spend as long as it takes making it up to you.”
Stiles pressed a chaste kiss to Derek’s chest, right over his heart. “No, you’ve done that. You protected me and Connor when you shouldn’t have even been able to. You know what you did was wrong. I know you know what you did was wrong. And you won’t do it again.”
Derek nodded.
Stiles levied himself up on to his elbows. “I just mean, I know living with someone who doesn’t trust you couldn’t have been easy. But thank you for giving me enough time to learn to trust you again.”
“Stiles, I love you. Whatever you need, I’ll always give you that.”
“I love you too.”