Work Text:
He doesn’t know what wakes him. He lies in the darkness and strains his ears, listening for any unusual sounds, but there is only silence. Complete silence is something utterly unknown to him, but in this house, he supposes, it’s to be expected. The sounds of the town lying on the foot of the hill don’t carry that far, and Stiles guesses it’s well past midnight; all servants have long since retired to their rooms. The house is asleep, the only sounds in the dark of the night are the rustling of palm trees swaying in the wind and the faint noise of distant waves crashing against the shore.
He’s about to dismiss the eerie feeling taking possession of him as a result of being unaccustomed to sleeping in Governor Argent’s house, to not being used to deal with the absence of noise, of drunk people roaming the streets at night, shouting and laughing as they go, of people busy and working even at night, of dogs barking and cats yowling, when there’s a quiet clang of metal just outside his door, followed by a low curse.
“Quiet!” Someone hisses, and then there’s a quick shuffle of footsteps as the men round the corner.
Stiles sits up, throws back his covers and fumbles for a match in the darkness. A look at his watch in the unsteady candlelight shows him that it’s half past one in the morning. Way too early – or late, depending how you look at it – for any employees to walk around the house. Definitely not the time for the guards to be anywhere but their assigned posts outside the main doors. Stiles isn’t stupid; a lifetime of living with a soldier has taught him to know the difference between pots clanging and swords rattling. Both may be made of metal but they sound nothing alike, and what he just heard outside was nothing as innocent as a warming pan.
Armed people going through the mansion in the middle of the night can only mean one thing: intruders.
He hastily pulls a shirt over his head, slips into his boots and sneaks outside, leaving the candle behind. He may not stay in Argent’s house often, but he knows his way around the corridors well enough to navigate them without the light. Most importantly, he cannot afford to draw attention to himself, not when he has to get to Allison to make sure she’s safe. He doesn’t know for sure whether they’re here for her, but robbers seldom attempt to get past the guards patrolling outside; the Argents are the richest family in Beacon Hills Bay, no doubt, but no amount of gold is worth the risk of getting caught. And so far, all of the – admittedly few – people who’ve tried to rob the estate have been caught before so much as setting foot onto the actual grounds and have been put to justice, because the Argents aren’t only the richest family, they’re also the most important and influential one, and they have the guards to prove it. Everyone in Beacon Hills Bay knows it’s just not worth the hassle antagonising them; the price one pays is usually too high.
It’s been quiet here for years. It worries Stiles that this group has made it this far without anyone stopping them, especially now that Allison is the only family member currently at home and the guards have been doubled for her protection. Not that anyone would’ve thought they’d actually be needed, but Chris Argent is paranoid like that. Rightly so, it seems now.
Stiles contemplates yelling for help, but a look outside the open shutters of one window confirms what he’s already suspected: the guards at the front door are lying on the ground, motionless. The main gate hasn’t been opened (clever, it makes too much noise and would’ve woken half the house), so he assumes they came in through the back. The guards there will most likely be down as well.
Stiles swallows and turns away, tries not to think too hard about the familiar faces of the people lying in the dirt outside and thanks God, selfishly, that his father isn’t out there tonight. He can’t see any blood, but he’s seen enough dead bodies in his seventeen years to know that no blood doesn’t necessarily equate to not dead. There are many ways of killing someone silently and without making a mess.
He slinks back into the shadows and hurries down the corridor leading to the east wing. The intruders are nowhere to be seen until he reaches the door of Allison’s chambers and he quickly slips inside, shuts the door as quietly as possible. The curtains are open, letting a few stray rays of moonlight in, just enough to illuminate the room. Allison is still fast asleep, her dark halo of hair surrounding her angelic face and she barely shifts when he shakes her shoulder. “Allison,” he whispers urgently, and then again, a little louder, “Allison! Allison, wake up, we need to go, there’s someone in the house, we need to get you out of here right now!”
She’s awake in an instant. “What do you mean, there’s someone in the house?” she asks, sitting up in her bed and setting her face into a stern mask, something he knows she’s copied from her mother and that she only puts on in dire situations that she needs to handle.
“They took down the guards and they’re inside, now hurry, we have to go.” He grabs the dress still hanging over the folding screen and goes to search for her boots while she disentangles the waves of fabric. He seriously doesn’t know how girls even move in those things, and feels glad that she’s not the kind of highborn lady who’d insist on putting on a corset and risk getting caught rather than look improper.
Stiles is still contemplating the best escape route – down the servants’ wing, maybe, then through the garden, duck through the stables and take the smaller path leading down to the town – when the door flies open, revealing four people blocking the way. Their clothes are well worn, simple but of good quality, and surprisingly clean.
“Well,” one of them says languidly, wolfish smile playing across the face, “this is not what I expected to find. Miss Argent has a lover boy, has she?”
And I’ll be damned, Stiles thinks, that’s a bloody girl.
It’s more visible when she steps forward past the three guys accompanying her, despite the hat that covers most of her face and a mess of blonde curls. The clothes don’t really do much to hide all her curves. He’d like to dismiss her as non-threatening, but the way she holds herself and the sword on her hip has him know better. Plus, he’s seen Allison with a bow and arrow in her hand; maybe not the most feminine sport, but she’s a better shot than all the men in Beacon Hills Bay put together, so Stiles has learnt early on in his life to never underestimate women wielding weapons. One of the men, a black giant who seems to be made entirely of muscles crosses the room in three quick strides and grabs Allison before Stiles can so much as twitch, while the others – a tall, lanky one and a smaller guy with an arrogant look on his face – watch, bored.
Stiles wants nothing more than to rush over to Allison’s side, but he knows it won’t do any good. If anything, it would probably only put her in danger. He won’t stand a chance against them, not being this seriously outnumbered and not even armed. He’s had training and knows how to handle a sword, but even so, he’s never had to kill anyone, and he’d bet his monthly allowance that they have that kind of experience.
These aren’t ordinary thieves. They’re pirates.
Allison struggles in the man’s arms, gets a few good kicks in and Stiles thinks that maybe, if he’s fast enough, if he can take him by surprise – but then there’s suddenly a blade biting into the skin of his throat, just shy of drawing blood.
“Ah, ah, ah,” the girl tsks. “Don’t even think about it. And you,” she says, turning to Allison, who’s ceased her struggles the moment Stiles was in danger – of course, of course, that’s what they do, they protect each other – “if you so much as try to run or scream, I’ll cut his pretty white throat.”
“Erica,” the tall, lanky guy admonishes.
She shrugs.
“Don’t get your panties in a twist, Lahey,” the smaller guy says haughtily. “It’s just a stupid little stable boy, it’s not like he’s important.”
“No,” the black guy says sharply, and both the guys and the girl visibly deflate, but nod. Stiles carefully files that piece of information away. “Miss Allison, if you would accompany us,” he says, which is rich coming from a guy thrice her size holding her arms behind her back so she can’t even struggle without hurting herself and someone holding a knife to her best friend’s throat. What choice does she have?
The bite of steel is cold against his neck, and when Stiles twists, he feels a sharp burst of pain followed by a trickle of warm blood running down his skin, but he manages to get a hold on the hilt and he’s almost there, pulling the girl off balance.
And then suddenly he’s lying flat on the ground, a knee digging into the space between his shoulder blades, knocking the breath right out of him, and his arms are twisted so far behind his back that every tiny movement threatens to dislocate his shoulders.
“That was brave,” Erica tells him, “but stupid.”
“Don’t hurt him!” Allison’s voice is surprisingly steady. “Don’t hurt him, I’ll go with you.”
“No,” Stiles rasps out. The weight on his back grows heavier, and he gasps, trying to get some air into his lungs. Allison shakes her head minutely, warning him not to do anything stupid.
“Your cooperation is appreciated, Milady,” the black guy says. Stiles wants to punch him for being so ridiculously polite and calm. “If you would follow me...”
“Where are you taking me?” Allison demands.
“You’ll see. Now please keep quiet. I don’t want to gag you, Miss, but I will if I have to.”
“What about him?” Assface, as Stiles has decided to dub the small, arrogant one for lack of a real name, jerks his chin at Stiles.
“I’ll knock him out,” Erica says easily.
“We don’t know when he’ll wake,” Lahey interrupts quietly. “We need to put a good distance between us and Beacon Hills Bay before he alerts anyone. We should tie him up and make sure he can’t make no sound.”
“Would be easier just to kill him.” Assface shrugs.
“If you take her,” Stiles grinds out, “you have to take me too.”
Erica laughs. “You don’t really want that, lover boy.”
“But you do,” he says. “You wanna collect a nice ransom for her? Well, you’ll get more for two, right?”
Assface laughs, and jabs his toes into Stiles’ ribs. “Who’d pay a ransom for a stable boy?”
“I’m the only son of the head of the city guard, you asshole,” Stiles snaps, ignoring Allison’s widened eyes pleading him to stay silent. “He’ll pay.”
The group look at each other, frowning.
“What do you think, Boyd?” Erica asks.
The black man – Boyd apparently – gives Stiles a long measuring look. “He may be lying.”
“He sure is eager to stay with his girl,” Assface snorts.
“I say we take him,” Lahey says. “We can’t afford to lose more time arguing around. Doesn’t matter if he’s lying. If he is, it’ll be easy to cut him loose. If he isn’t, then I think two bargaining chips are better than one.”
Boyd nods. “Haul him along.”
Stiles recognises the ship immediately. It’s impossible not to, what with it being the number one topic everyone talks about. The first stories he’d heard about The Black Wolf had been rumours and gossip down at the tailor’s shop that used to belong to his mother and that he helps out in a few times a week. He’d listened to them avidly, but he’d never taken them very seriously. The tragedy of the Hale family’s demise and the subsequent descent into piracy of the surviving members are common knowledge but no one seems to know any details. He’s heard hundreds of different versions, every one more sinister than the previous ones and some so unbelievable he sometimes laughed outright, regardless of how impolite that was. Most of it, it seems, has been made up out of this air.
Lately, however, he’s heard the name out of his father’s mouth with increasing frequency. Derek Hale and his ragtag bunch of crew members have been causing the Argents a lot of trouble, he knows, and he’s starting to wonder whether this is just a stupid personal feud or whether maybe Derek Hale actually believes the most insane rumours going around, the ones that are only whispered in dark corners, the ones that accuse the Argents of burning the Hales alive.
Well. Derek Hale is a pirate, which presupposes a certain level of insanity either way and he seems to be one of the more reckless ones, judging from what Stiles has heard. Whether he believes the theory or not, Stiles doesn’t believe he and Allison are in for a pleasant ride.
The closer they get to the galleon idling in the deeper waters, the heavier the feeling of dread in Stiles’ stomach gets. Boyd and Lahey diminish the distance between it and their rowboat with strong, even strokes. Stiles contemplates, panicking, to jump into the water and drag Allison with him, hoping that the dark night will make it impossible for the pirates to shoot them or find them again in the water, but rationally, he realises their chances are slim, even if they could swim to the shore, which would be quite a feat. They’ve quickly put a great distance between themselves and the coast, too great to cover in their clothes, probably. Also, he knows the pirates won’t just let them get away. They’ve gone through too much trouble capturing Allison to give her up that easily.
Once they reach the ship, Erica gets to her feet - how she manages to stand up straight with the boat rocking on the waves he doesn’t know - and whistles sharply. The answer is instantaneous, a ladder being let down, and Erica grabs it and throws Stiles and Allison a smug grin. “You go first.”
“Wonderful,” Stiles murmurs, and starts to climb. There are hands reaching out for him when he makes it to the main deck, offering to pull him aboard, but he swats them away, gets to his feet and reaches down to help Allison up, who’s been following him closely. She’s always been the better climber of the two, so he’s not surprised to find her close on his heels.
“Everything go alright?” the pirate who tried to help Stiles aboard asks the other crew members once they join them on deck. He’s shorter than Stiles but more muscular, built the way sailors always are after years of heavy work. Stiles can’t make out his face in the darkness, but the voice sounds vaguely familiar.
“There were some unforeseen events,” Boyd says, motioning at Stiles. “But no trouble.”
Stiles feels vaguely insulted.
“There you are,” another voice, this one female and sharp, cuts through the darkness. “Took you bloody long enough.” There’s the sound of a match being lit, and a moment later a hand lantern is almost shoved in Stiles’ face and he’s being scrutinised by a small, beautiful redhead who is looking at him with a frown. “You pick up a stray?”
“He belongs to her,” Erica says. “Follows her around like a puppy. It’s adorable. He refuses to admit he fancies her.”
The redhead rolls her eyes. “And you brought him here?” she asks in a tone that suggests she thinks they're all imbeciles.
“He may be valuable.”
“Whatever. Take it up with the Captain. We don’t have any time to waste,” she says unnecessarily; the others are already scurrying off and making themselves busy hoisting the sails and getting the ship ready to carry them out on the open sea. “You two, follow me.”
Allison stands up straight. “We want to talk to your Captain,” she proclaims loudly. “Now.”
Everyone stills around her. Stiles can see the redhead’s eyes drift toward the quarterdeck where a tall figure is looming close to the rudder, nothing but a dark, imposing shadow in the night.
“It’s within my rights to be informed who it is that’s taking me and my cousin hostage, and for what reason.”
“Sweetheart, I don’t think you can go around blathering on about your rights in your current situation. We’re not in a place where your every desire gets catered to. I shall tell the Captain of your request, and he will come see you if it pleases him.”
Stiles feels a wave of hot rage washing over him. He doesn’t know what he expected; one certainly cannot hope to be treated civilly when faced with pirates but he knows for sure that Derek Hale was raised to have manners. His family used to be one of the wealthiest and most distinguished families in Beacon Hills Bay but Stiles can see now that every shred of respectability has been lost, which doesn’t bode well for him and Allison. He feels like giving the redhead a taste of her own derisive demeanour but unlike some people, he was raised to be polite - mostly, at least. Definitely to women, even when they’re pirates.
“You -” he begins, but doesn’t get any further. He’s interrupted by a rough voice barking orders that resonate across the deck.
“Martin, McCall, get to your bloody posts, I don’t pay you to gossip like fishwives!” Derek Hale stomps down the stairs leading up to the quarterdeck and stalks toward them. He barely acknowledges Allison’s presence, just gives her a cold once-over before his gaze zeroes in on Stiles. “Who the hell is this?” he asks gruffly. “Dammit, Boyd, I don’t have time to take care of another charity case who needs help wiping his ass and has to be taught everything about sailing from scratch.”
It’s not the derogatory language nor the sneer on Hale’s face that makes Stiles finally explode. It’s the assumption that Stiles might have even the slightest desire to be one of them. The last string of control inside him snaps, and his fury unravels faster and more dangerously than a hurricane. He takes a quick step forward that brings him perilously close to Hale, his face only inches from the pirate. Stiles notices, absentmindedly, that Hale isn’t actually any taller than he is; his broader build just makes him seem more imposing. He can see a flicker of surprise in his eyes upon seeing Stiles’ ire, but he doesn’t flinch, doesn’t take a step back. Of course, why would he be afraid of what he deems to be nothing but a kid?
Stiles sneers. “You think I’m here for you? You think I wanna join your crew, become like you, a barbarous, dirty outcast who hasn’t got a shred of decency, who steals and plunders, rapes and murders and enjoys it? I’d rather die!” he spits out viciously. “The likes of you, you’ll never be able to wash the blood off your hands, and you’ll rot in the deepest circle of hell. There’s no place any of you will ever belong. ”
It takes quite a bit of effort reining himself in, keeping himself from shoving the pirate or maybe even punching him in the face. Instead, Stiles chooses a much lower blow. “I’m certain your parents would’ve been proud had they been able to see what you’ve become.”
Derek Hale looks absolutely ready to murder him on the spot. He hadn’t seemed to care much about Stiles’ accusations, had seemed faintly amused at best, but his family is very obviously a sore spot. On second thought, it hadn’t been wise to antagonise his captor, the most dangerous man in the Caribbean, considering Hale doesn’t even really have a use for him. He’s just spoken his own death sentence, and God, this will kill his father. He can see Hale’s hand flying to the sword at his side, gripping the hilt tightly and a second later, Stiles feels the cold bite of steel against his throat again for the second time this night. He’s mildly surprised he isn’t choking on his own blood already but for now Hale seems content just tipping his chin with the tip of his sword and waiting for Stiles to back down, to beg for his life.
He won’t.
“Stiles!” Allison cries, an edge of desperation to her voice. And then, much more composed, she says, “don’t hurt him!”
Hale just sends her a flat look that demands, wordlessly, a good reason why he shouldn’t.
“The members of your crew insinuated you mean to keep us for ransom. I am sure my father will pay a large sum to ensure my well-being upon my return, and he would do the same to make sure my cousin remained unharmed.”
“Don’t lie to me, Missie,” Hale says. “I know Argent well enough to know he has no nephews.”
“He’s my cousin once removed,” Allison says. “And the only son of John Stilinski, head of the city guard. Let Stiles live, I promise you won’t regret it.”
In the background, Stiles can hear someone repeat his name under his breath, confused and incredulous but he doesn’t pay much attention to it. He’s used to this reaction upon people hearing his name for the first time and there are far more pressing matters at hand. Like, for example, the blade pressing against his skin.
Hale snorts. “Why would I believe you?”
“It’s true,” the young man who hauled Stiles aboard suddenly says. “She’s speaking the truth.”
“You know him?” the Captain asks.
“Know him? That’s my best friend,” he enthuses, and suddenly everything clicks into place.
The familiar voice. A person who obviously knew him. The name Hale had called, one that he hadn’t registered at first. McCall.
“Scott?” Stiles asks. It can’t be. It can’t be.
Except that it is. The young man shouldering past Derek Hale wears a version of Scott’s face that is older than any Stiles has ever seen, but it’s still undeniably Scott: the same deep, kind brown eyes, same crooked jaw, same wide, childishly pleased grin.
“Stiles, mate, it’s good to see you.” Scott sounds honestly, genuinely happy, just like he used to when they were kids and running along the beach, tackling each other and rubbing sand and mud into each other’s faces. Like he used to sound before he told Stiles with a grave voice that he was joining the merchant navy, that he was going to become a sailor on his father’s ship and earn money to help out his mother. He’d been twelve, and scrawny as hell, only a wisp of a boy, not really cut out for the heavy work on a ship, especially not under someone as cold-hearted and indifferent as his father.
Stiles had begged him not to go, but Scott had insisted, had kept saying that he had to, and left on a cool winter morning, never to be heard from again. The only reason Stiles had been able to assume that he hadn’t dropped dead under Captain McCall’s command had been that whenever he’d seen Melissa around town, she hadn’t looked like she’d been crying her eyes out over losing her son. He’d known Melissa had been sent money every once in a while, too. It’s nice to see the money actually came from Scott and wasn’t a meagre apology for getting their son killed.
He should be happier about seeing his best childhood friend alive. And, well, he is glad to see him, seemingly unharmed, but his joy is being dimmed by the circumstances. Scott, for all intents and purposes, has absolutely no reason to be on Derek Hale’s ship.
“What are you doing here?” he asks, eyes narrowing in suspicion, purposely taking a step back to put a little distance between them, to avoid the hug Scott was going for.
Scott’s face falls at the obvious rejection. His arms are hanging uselessly at his side. He opens his mouth to say something, closes it again, like he doesn’t know how to find the words.
Stiles doesn’t need him to explain. It’s all blatantly evident, once he has all the facts.
Scott isn’t working for the navy anymore.
He knows Scott can see it on his face when Stiles finishes the puzzle, can see the emotional turmoil it causes him the moment he realises that his best friend ran off and became a bloody pirate.
“Stiles,” Scott begins hesitantly, reaching out for him.
Stiles feels his features harden. “Don’t touch me,” he warns him, words poison on his tongue.
The hurt look on Scott’s face is too much for him to handle. He was never good at resisting his best friend’s puppy eyes. But this isn’t the Scott he knew anymore, this isn’t his best friend. The man in front of him is not the boy who crept into his bed the nights after Stiles’ mother died to curl himself around him and help stifle the violent sobs shaking his body. It’s not the boy he stole Finstock’s pastries with, not the boy who taught him how to swim, not the boy he snuck into the fortress to watch the soldiers practise, not the boy he taught how to read and write.
Scott McCall may be alive, but his best friend is dead.
Stiles starts to turn away, can’t stand to watch this stranger wearing his friend’s face when he feels warm fingers wrapping around his wrist. His fist connects with Scott’s jaw with a loud crack, and the pirate stumbles backwards as Stiles hisses both out of fury and pain and flexes his hand. He doesn’t have a lot of experience punching other people in the face; he thinks it’s not supposed to hurt like this, to make his knuckles bleed after a single blow, but he welcomes the pang of pain shooting through his hand.
“I said,” he seethes, enunciating every word with a sharpness that cuts his mouth open, makes him wonder why he doesn’t taste metal and blood on his tongue, “don’t you fucking dare touch me!”
Allison draws in a sharp breath beside him, lays a hand upon his arm in what he thinks must look to everyone else like a soothing touch but is actually a vise-like grip meant to hold him back, keep him reined in; a reminder to not get himself into more trouble. Scott brings his hand up to touch his lip gingerly where it’s split open, carefully wipes away the blood trickling down his chin. He doesn’t move to answer Stiles’ attack in kind, just nods and accepts it as if he deserves it.
Which he does.
Derek Hale, meanwhile, is looking at Stiles with cold eyes gleaming in the pale moonlight. “Erica,” he says curtly, “accompany Miss Argent and Mister Stilinski to their rooms. And make sure they don’t get any stupid ideas. Everyone else, back to work.”
The door falls shut behind him with a loud bang, and the sound of keys turning makes the silence that surrounds him final. Stiles draws in a shaky breath and tries to suppress the scream that’s threatening to crawl up his throat, at least until Erica’s stomping footsteps have faded into the distance and he’s sure no one can hear him. Not even Allison, who had been unceremoniously shoved into a cabin at the beginning of the corridor. Stiles, it seems, gets the one right next to the Captain, to intimidate him, probably, or maybe just to make it more convenient for Hale to slit his throat if Stiles causes any more trouble.
The panic that’s been steadily building inside him ever since he first heard the pirates sneaking into the house crashes over him now, barreling through his carefully erected walls with a force that Stiles cannot hope to counter. He gasps in a sharp breath, and then another one, desperate to get some oxygen into his lungs, but even the most menial, natural task becomes nigh infeasible with his jackrabbit heart hammering in his chest and his muscles disobeying him. His muscles shake so hard he can barely start sliding down the wall before his knees give out under him completely and he slumps to the ground, black spots dancing around the edges of his vision.
He gasps and chokes for a long time, before the panic dwindles down gradually and painfully slowly. Every intake of breath, every beat of his heart against his rib cage hurts in his chest. Stiles swallows away the taste of bile in his mouth and clears his throat, forces his muscles into compliance and drags himself over to the small cot at the right side of the wall, heaves himself up and buries his head in the hard pillow, trying to ignore how the cold sheen of sweat covering his body makes his clothes stick to his skin uncomfortably and makes him shiver with the breeze coming through the tiny porthole.
He needs to be smart about this, he knows, if he wants to survive. If he wants Allison to survive, to ensure she doesn’t get hurt due to his mistakes.
He cannot let the panic overwhelm him again.
He cannot dwell on the dangerous glint of Captain Hale’s eyes, the promise of violence in them.
He cannot think about his father and how devastated he will be to find his son gone.
He cannot think about his best friend, turned into everything he once despised.
He screws his eyes shut, wills his body to relax. Tomorrow, he thinks. Tomorrow, with a clearer mind, if God wills it, after a few hours of sleep, he will formulate a plan.