Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/1076012.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Underage
  Category:
      M/M
  Fandom:
      Teen_Wolf_(TV)
  Relationship:
      Derek_Hale/Stiles_Stilinski, Isaac_Lahey/Heather_(Teen_Wolf)
  Character:
      Derek_Hale, Stiles_Stilinski, Heather_(Teen_Wolf), Sheriff_Stilinski,
      Stiles'_Mother_(Teen_Wolf)
  Additional Tags:
      Alternate_Universe_-_Historical, Civil_War
  Stats:
      Published: 2013-12-09 Words: 24768
****** Glasses, Coins and Golden Rings ******
by nubianamy
Summary
     Stiles and his mother have worked the farm together since his father
     left for the War of the Rebellion, ten years ago in 1862. His best
     friend Heather is the only one who knows what happened on the day the
     soldiers came through their valley, and the improbable hope to which
     they both hold.
Notes
     Written for the Teen Wolf Big Bang. Beautiful art by containerpark
     can be seen at http://containerpark.livejournal.com/2922.html
     This story was inspired by the episode 3x02 Chaos Rising, in which
     Stiles' longstanding friendship with the character Heather was
     introduced. Basically, I wanted Stiles to have every opportunity to
     get married to the girl next door and be respectable, and for him to
     reject it in favor of an impossible dream.
     It's a songfic, because everything I write is inspired by music in
     one way or another. The lyrics to "Reunion Hill" and a link to the
     song by Richard Shindell are provided at the end, since they contain
     spoilers for the story.
     I have not given Stiles' father a name, because the fact that we
     don't know what it is is an important part of the show, but his
     mother is essentially an OC, so I felt freer to play with her.
     An apology: historical fiction is not my genre. I really, really
     don't know anything about the American Civil War, nor about the
     military. Pretty much all of what I know about this time period came
     from quick and dirty Internet research. It still took me hours and
     hours, but any inaccuracies are definitely my own fault. I've gone
     for flavor rather than rigor. Thanks to penthea for beta-reading.
     Warnings for angst-ridden descriptions of picking up one's life after
     war (but no actual descriptions of war), culturally entrenched sexism
     and homophobia, mildly graphic sex with no mention of protection,
     this being 150 years ago, and over-the-top Sterek-flavored romance.
     If that's your cup of tea, please enjoy.
     -amy
 
[Glasses, Coins and Golden Rings title]
===============================================================================
[Map of Maryland during the Civil War]
===============================================================================
Montgomery Village, Maryland, north of Washington, DC
September 1872
Stiles woke as he usually did: to the sound of Elliott crowing his fool head
off, making him wonder not for the first time what God must have been thinking
when he invented roosters. He rolled to one side of the tick mattress,
swallowing on the sour taste of sleep, and opened one eye. It was still dark,
but according to Elliott, it was long past time to get up and moving. Elliott
was probably right.
"The farm ain't going to run itself," he muttered, his father's words on his
own lips. It made him feel a little disgruntled, to be talking so much like his
father, but he figured as long as no one heard him but himself and God, he
could probably live with that.
Stiles struggled into his clammy breeches and managed to plant his feet into
his boots, waiting at the side of his bed. It wasn't the most mannerly thing to
wear his boots into the house, but he'd stepped in too many puddles in his
socks on the way from the door to the back room throughout the damp, muddy
fall. Currently, he only owned one pair of socks without holes, and until he
managed to wrangle a new pair out of Heather, he wanted to keep his socks as
dry as he could. There was nothing worse than wet socks.
He could hear his mother stirring. Usually, he managed to get up before her and
light a fire in the stove. It wasn't that she wasn't a tough Yank herself, but
Stiles didn't want his mother to ever have cause to say he wasn't pulling his
weight, especially not as long as it was just the two of them, less'n he
counted Jess and Annie, the hired help.
Pulling his weight was a matter of course when you were the man of the house.
It was still hard to respond when other people called him Mister Stilinski, but
there hadn't been anybody else to call that in almost ten years. He might as
well start agreeing when folks called it his farm. His and his mother's, and
that was just a fact.
"You can keep your jo-fired morning speech, Mr. Elliott," he called, knocking
the frost off the milk pail waiting on the back porch. "Crowing your fool head
off like somebody cared what you had to say."
"Stiles," his mother shushed, emerging from the bedroom. "Do you have to start
the day with an argument?"
"It ain't me crowing like the dickens," he protested. "I'd keep my thoughts to
myself if I sounded like that. You'd think God would've made the rooster's
voice a little more pleasant if he wanted folks to wake up in a good mood."
His mother smiled despite herself, and leaned hard on the pump handle beside
the kitchen sink, propping the pail close to keep it from splashing. "Only you
would have such creative thoughts when there's cows to milk and eggs to gather.
Don't forget to check to make sure that fox hasn't burrowed under the fence
again. I'm not losing one more pullet to his wiles."
The fence was intact, which Stiles thought might be as much due to Elliott and
Barnaby making such a ruckus as anything else. The two roosters had divided up
the barnyard between them, and when he watched them strutting and scraping in
the dirt, Stiles couldn't help but think of two pompous English noblemen,
wearing their finery and talking like there wasn't anything more important than
who owned what piece of land. He grinned, watching Barnaby comb his green head-
feathers and shake his wattle.
"Well, I swan, you think this is your farm too," he remarked to the rooster,
lifting the heavy wooden latch on the barn door. "Like your name was on the
deed. Mrs. Stilinski and Son - and Barnaby."
The cows were glad to see him, it was true, and he could count on that, but he
knew it was only because he took their milk and made them comfortable. Stiles
was only as valuable as he was useful; he had no illusions about that. He
really did do his best to run the farm the way he thought his father would have
wanted. It was just so easy to get distracted. There were so many things in the
world that weren't within a stone's throw of the Stilinski farm. Was it
surprising, then, that he often found himself going looking for them?
Harriet and Ebenezer reported his mother's arrival before he could hear her
himself, whickering and shuffling in their stalls. Stiles didn't bother to look
up from the milking.
"You ain't gonna get the horses to work harder by feeding them crabapples,
Mother," he said.
"I don't feed them to make them work harder," she replied, her skirts rustling
as she stepped carefully across the straw-strewn floor. "I do it because it's
kind. The world is short on kindness these days."
There was no doubt in Stiles' mind that when it came to kindness, Claudia
Stilinski could match every woman or man east of the Potomac. He wasn't vying
for such a title himself, and he guessed nobody would have expected it of him.
He was the cheeky one, and she was the nice one, and that was fine.
"I aim to get the rest of the potatoes and beets out of the ground this
morning," he said casually, "and then I'm meeting Heather for early dinner."
It was a credit to her character that his mother didn't reprimand him about
spending time with a married woman, as most folks would have. He knew he wasn't
doing their family's reputation any good by carrying on with Heather, as though
they were still youths splashing in Hardpan Creek, pretending to be pioneers.
Stiles knew Heather cared about reputation more than he did, but thankfully not
enough to stop meeting with him for lunch.
"I'll wrap a loaf of johnny-cake for the two of you to share," was all his
mother said.
The horses and cows turned out to pasture, the sheep rounded up - Stiles hadn't
had a sheep dog since their last one got foot-rot and died three years back,
and honestly, he'd never seen much need for another dog - and his breakfast et,
he was able to get a good chunk of his harvesting done before the dew was even
dry on the field. He had energy to spare, it was true, sometimes more than he
knew what to do with. "Better not to court trouble," his father had said often
to Stiles when he was a boy, which to him meant keep busy. To Stiles, it
meant don't get caught. Luckily, he'd had cartloads of experience at both of
those things.
"Will you ask after the state of Heather's grandfather for me?" his mother
asked when Stiles returned to the house to wash his face and collect the
johnny-cake. "His health was still poor the last I heard, and I wouldn't want
to miss important news."
He swiped a crabapple from the bowl on the table. "Sure thing. I'll be back for
afternoon milking."
Stiles could probably have taken the walk across Reunion Hill to Heather's farm
in his sleep. The fields between their farms changed with the season, but the
brush and trees surrounding them were a frame that remained the same, year
after year. Since the war had ended, and once Heather's parents had moved into
town after Isaac and Heather were married and took over the farm, the only
people who tramped through those fields anymore were Stiles and Heather. Isaac
was a good neighbor, but he had no interest in his wife's childhood memories.
Stiles hopped the fence, resting a hand on the third-largest beech, and paused
to steady his breath. Sometimes it felt like he wasn't even alive anymore
except when he was here, on his own land, remembering. The men, gathered in
clumps of four and five, checking their rifles, tense and ready. The sound of
the officers, giving terse orders to assemble and fall out, and hundreds of
trudging feet, walking across the hill north toward Burkittsville. The silence
they left behind, and the trinkets. He still found them sometimes, concealed in
the tall grass, tangled under each year's piled leaves: a pair of spectacles, a
compass, a shaving brush. He had an assortment of the most interesting ones
lined up under the eaves of his loft, hidden where his mother would never find
them.
The hill rose sharply up from the bank by the creek. There was enough cover
that it was easy, if he walked carefully through the underbrush, to sneak up on
Heather as she waited on the ridge on the other side. Stiles circled around
behind her, watching her head droop in the sun, hidden under her bonnet.
Finally he scooped up a handful of pine cones and tossed one overhand, arcing
lazily through the air to connect with her back.
"You little beast!" she protested, but she was laughing, as he knew she would.
"It isn't even noon and you're already full of the dickens."
"When am I not?" he grinned, dropping the remaining cones and depositing
himself on the rock beside her. She'd spread out her skirt so it covered her
legs, her feet barely peeking out from underneath. Stiles decided it wouldn't
be decorous of him to comment on how pretty she looked.
She belongs to another man now, he imagined people would say. You lost your
chance with her. He would respond that he'd never had a claim on her before she
was married, and that nothing had really changed between them. He could have
said, too, how he knew something about belonging to someone else, but that was
a tale only Heather knew, and he'd never tell it to another soul.
She smiled playfully. "Well, then, perhaps I shouldn't bother to show you what
I found on the way over here this morning."
"Perhaps I should eat all this johnny-cake myself," Stiles countered, opening
his jaw wide as though to take the entire bundle, cloth and string and all,
into his gullet. She laughed, pulling at his arm, and he relented, letting her
open the package and divide the corn-flour pan bread into two even portions.
She had a handkerchief full of blackberries to share, only a little overripe,
along with a piece of cheese and a jug full of good, cold water.
Beside them on the rock, Heather placed something that glittered. Stiles
reached out to pick it up, but she covered it with her hand.
"It's not his," she said, looking at him with apology in her eyes. As though it
was her fault that her father had returned from the war and his father hadn't.
As though she could have done anything about it, at all.
"It's all right." He waited for her to move her hand, and when he did, he could
feel the smooth curve of metal under his fingers. Stiles picked it up and held
it to the light. A ring, beautifully wrought. He felt a wrench in his gut, but
gave her what he hoped was an acceptably approving smile. "Nice."
"You keep that one," Heather said, talking through her mouthful of johnny-cake.
He was almost certain she never would have done that in front of anyone else,
particularly not her fastidious husband. "I took the last things we found, the
tinder-box and the fourpence."
"Thanks." Stiles slipped it into his pocket. He was conscious of its weight all
through dinner - it, and that of the other ring, the one that remained strung
safely on a string around his neck, tucked under his shirt.
Even with the ring serving as a distraction, he remembered to ask about her
grandfather, who was fine, and listened to Heather chatter about the most
recent round of sheep who'd turned up slaughtered along the south-east border
of her farm. He made appropriate mmm-ing noises, hoping she wouldn't call him
on his obvious twitchiness.
"Isaac's father thinks the kills happen too regular to be blamed on wolves,"
she said, gathering up the paper from the cheese. "But my aunt says wolves can
be fearsome smart."
Stiles let out a loud and probably rude snort. "Your aunt reckons she knows
something about everything, no matter how inconsequential. She's the one who
decided I'd been cursed by the Devil when it t'weren't anything but a nasty
little ground hornet in my trousers."
"Stiles," Heather hissed, nudging his shoulder with the flat of her hand,
smiling. "Your language. Let a lady keep her delicate sensibilities intact."
He hooted with laughter. "I know exactly what kind of a lady you are, Heather,
and there isn't anything delicate about you."
Her smile remained, tugging at the corners of her mouth. "You might need to
qualify that statement. I might be described to be that, by some, for a goodly
period of time. Months. Nine of them, to be exact."
Stiles didn't make the connection for another minute and a half. When he
finally realized what she was talking about, he leapt up from the rock,
scattering cake crumbs all over Heather's skirt.
"What?" he yelped. "You're not - I mean, you can't be -"
"Stiles," she said again, more calmly now. "You can't really be all that
surprised. I've been married for three years."
He settled down beside her feet on the soft, old carpet of leaves and pine
needles, staring up at her as he took her hands. "I don't really have any basis
for comparison. Just - for the love of God, Heather! A baby?"
She sniffed. "The least you can say is congratulations. I haven't even told my
own mother yet."
Stiles knew that wasn't saying much, considering what a delightful bitch
Heather's mother was most of the time, but he hugged her tight around the ribs
- quickly, then let her go before she could start to feel strange about it.
"I'm not even sure what to say. You, a mother? Feels like we've hardly stopped
being children ourselves."
"I'd say twenty-six is a grand sight older than a child." She touched his
shirt, brushing off crumbs. "We've passed too many milestones for it to be
anything but thus. Look at us, Stiles. I'm Mrs. Lahey, and you're Mr. -"
"Don't say it," he bit out sharply. She paused, staring down at him in
astonishment. "Really, I can't - I can't hear that name and have it be me. Not
from you."
Her brow furrowed. "Why?" She lay a hand on his sleeve. "Because you want me to
go on believing he's still alive? Or because I know things I shouldn't about
you?"
Stiles grimaced, turning away. He wasn't sure what was more shameful: that
underneath his denim and workcloth and muscled body, he was nothing but a dang
Mary boy... or that in ten years, he hadn't tried once to deny it to himself.
"I never asked you to pretend he was alive," he said instead. "You're far too
rational to swallow that kind of a whopper." He bent, gathering up the wrapper
from the johnny-cake. "I'm going to stay up here a little longer. You'd better
get home. Wouldn't want your mother to worry about us doing anything
indiscreet."
Heather's smile was thin, but she backed off, leaving him to his own worries.
She knew Stiles well enough to know when he got like this, all he was going to
do was bite back, like a hungry dog pushed into a bad temper. "As you wish.
I'll plan on seeing you at church this Sunday, then?"
"You bet," he muttered, running a hand through his hair. All he wanted at that
moment was to get out of the shade and into the sun.
Stiles didn't bother to attempt stealth now, crashing through the underbrush
and pushing through tangles of brambles and lines of beech and cedar that
hemmed in the field to the west, making his way toward Indian Boulder. The
crest of the ridge led him over and down a shallow slope to the improbably
large stone, resting in the curve of Reunion Hill. It was the shape of the
boulder that gave it its name, not any kind of event that might or might not
have taken place there - from the side, it was the spitting image of the face
of an Indian in profile - but it had certainly been the setting of many
childhood dramatic plays about a fictional Powhatan brave. Heather had never
minded being his fearless companion. Stiles sometimes wished they had taken the
time to write them all down. They were the kind of stories he would have liked
to pass on to Heather's children.
Considering you ain't likely to have none, he thought bitterly, scaling the
boulder with long practiced leaps and brief, well-placed handholds. In seconds,
he was atop it, gazing out over his family's land to the west, and Heather's -
the Lahey's - to the east. He let his hands, suddenly clenched into fists, drop
to his side, and sighed. Forget it. You're doomed to be Uncle Stilinski
forever, and whoever said that was a bad thing to be, anyway?
It didn't feel so good, neither, but he sat down on the rock right where he
was, letting himself give in to the unseemly tears that crept up on him
frequently at this time of year. It was as private as a graveyard up here, and
no one but the birds of prey who circled the crest of the hill would hear him
weep for sentimental memories and opportunities lost.
The afternoon was warm, though, and the surface of the boulder warmer. Once the
tears had passed, Stiles couldn't resist putting his cheek down against it,
feeling its reliable strength, and closing his eyes long enough to remember.
===============================================================================
Ten years ago, August 1862
Stiles knew, even without eavesdropping on his father - although did that, too,
sometimes - that the Union forces weren't doing well. He'd heard Heather's
father talking to the clerk at the post office about how Major General
McClellan had failed to capture Richmond in the July advance, and everybody
knew General Pope's armies had all been destroyed at Manassas. But most of
Stiles' news came from the soldiers themselves.
Stiles had seen them more frequently over the past several week, limping back
through the neighbor's fields in groups of three and four, returning to
Washington. He was there with his mother, most days that his father didn't need
him, giving the wounded soldiers bread and soup and water - along with whiskey
to those with more grievous wounds - while watching and listening and probably
talking more than a boy of sixteen should.
"You should be glad your son's too young to fight," one soldier told his
mother, his face as bitter and stony as a piece of the granite ridge beside
their farm. "We ain't doing so well. The way things are going, it'll be a short
autumn campaign."
Unlike most of his friends, Stiles hadn't wanted to go to war. The idea of
dying on a battlefield, before he became a man, before he'd had a chance to do
so many things - and there truly were so, so many - seemed indescribably cheap
and useless. Luckily, he wasn't quite tactless enough to say that in front of
the soldiers. He just nodded and kept his tongue as they grumbled and moaned
about what it had been like to engage in combat, and felt blessed to be home
with his father and mother.
Stiles' father had kept quiet through the stages of recruitment to the war.
He'd said publicly that he didn't need thirteen stinking government dollars a
month to get shot at, but Stiles knew that wasn't true, that their farm could
have sorely used that additional income. His father wasn't particularly
religious, not compared to his mother, and whatever he believed God thought
about the war, he kept to himself. Stiles guessed his reluctance to enlist had
more to do with their family and Stiles' mother than anything else, but this,
too, his father refrained from mentioning, and Stiles wasn't going to press him
for details.
And then one afternoon in late August, after he'd finished the evening milking
and the pigs had been slopped, and he'd rounded up the chickens into their coop
for the night, Stiles arrived at home to find his mother briskly setting the
table for eight. He paused in the kitchen, eyeing his father in the parlor
speaking to five unfamiliar men. Judging by their uniforms, they weren't
privates.
"What's Father doing?" he murmured.
"Being a gentleman." His mother handed him a bar of soap, and he went to the
pump in the corner, rolling up his sleeves. "Maybe a little bit of politicking.
The army has subsidies for farmers who host soldiers, coming through on their
way home."
Stiles hadn't known that, but it made sense, and maybe explained the presence
of so many soldiers on their land that summer. He strained to hear his father's
conversation while he lathered his filthy hands to the wrists. "They talking
about Manassas?"
"It's not my place to listen, Stiles," she said mildly. She passed him a clean
rag to dry his hands, then exchanged it for a handful of polished silver from
the sideboard. "Forks on the left, small spoon between the knife and big
spoon."
Stiles contained his derisive snort. As though a Union commander would care
where his fork sat, after being on the battlefield for the past five months. He
laid the silver carefully on the napkins, though, and his mother's smile of
approval made him feel good regardless. She poured coffee into their good china
and set the cups on each plate setting except Stiles' - he still hadn't
developed a taste for coffee - along with large slices of fresh, warm bread.
Stiles hovered by the bread basket, hovering hopefully, until she sighed.
"One," she said, and he grabbed the biggest piece. It didn't even need butter,
not when when it was fresh like that.
He munched, loitering just outside the parlor, listening to his father make
conversation with the soldiers. He heard the words "discouragement," and
"Maryland invasion," and "brigadier-general." The young, dark-haired officer
across from his father frowned.
"I don't see how that's relevant, sir," he said.
"Lincoln and McClellan don't get along," said the older man with the handlebar
moustache. "He's bringing in Halleck, from the western theater, to replace
him."
"He ain't no leader, Halleck," said the heavyset man beside him. "Ain't got the
strategy, ain't got the rapport with the troops. The Union needs real
commanders if it's going to recover from its losses."
"They're shipping in men from the West by railroad, too," the dark-haired one
said. His eyes flashed at Stiles' father. "Don't underestimate the importance
of fresh troops, particularly in regard to morale. We're seeing hundreds of men
deserting, every day." He had a cultured accent, one that was unfamiliar to
Stiles, but then every man who came through their fields had a slightly funny
way of talking to his ear.
Stiles' father nodded slowly, gripping his pipe in his hand. "It's not an easy
decision, Major. I suspect it's going to require some sustenance." He raised
his voice. "Claudia, are you ready for the invasion on your home territory?"
"I'll rely on the brigadier-general and his men to be gentlemen on this
terrain," she called back, smiling. Stiles felt a flush of admiration for his
mother. No matter how many dirty feet tramped through her clean house each
week, she never quarreled with his father on matters regarding the war.
Stiles' father paused in the doorway to meet Stiles' gaze. "I've relied on you
today to take care of the livestock," he said quietly. "Need I remind you about
any task?"
"No, father," Stiles said. It was a more sober response than he normally would
have given. Part of him wanted to put his best foot forward in front of these
impressive men, but mostly he didn't want to cause his father any further
stress. It was clear he was wrangling with some issue or another, his neck
tense and his jaw set, even though his demeanor was genial.
"Thank you." His father smiled then, and Stiles smiled back, startled. The
expression wasn't a common one on his father's face. "I suspect I don't need to
remind you to leave the biggest portion of dinner for our guests, either?"
"I'll do my durndest," Stiles vowed, grinning. "If mother don't mind me
cleaning my plate with an extra slice of her bread."
As it turned out, none of them were all that concerned about table manners,
although the dark-haired major, whose name was Hale, seemed to have some
awareness of which fork to use. He didn't put his elbows on the table, either,
and he said "please" and "thank you" like he'd been taught to eat properly.
Stiles guessed officers might come from fancier roots than most Maryland
farmers, which could explain it, but he still wasn't sure what to make of Major
Hale.
The cryptic conversation about the war continued through dinner, some of which
Stiles followed and some which he tuned out in favor of focusing on his
mother's roast pig and baked apples. The soldiers, however, didn't seem to
require a choice of one over the other.
"Lee's marshalling his men east of the Blue Ridge," the heavyset officer said
with his mouth full. "They'll be moving over the Potomac to Frederick as fast
as they can push us, but they've had as hard a time as we have with rations.
They're sick; they're tired. I think the Union forces can take them. We need to
be ready."
They all seemed to be watching Stiles' father as they ate, but as the heavyset
officer spoke, the old man with the handlebar moustache put down his fork and
gave him a nod. "I'm going to need a decision, Colonel."
Stiles wasn't sure what they meant, which one was the colonel. But it was his
father who glared at the one with the moustache, and his mother who sighed,
watching Stiles anxiously. Stiles finally cleared his throat.
"Colonel?" he repeated.
His father flinched, but didn't look away from the moustached man.
"I can't say it more plain than this, sir," said Hale, straightening his back.
"We need your leadership. I hope you know we wouldn't ask if it weren't dire.
This could be the turning point."
Stiles' father's jaw worked, and he flexed his fingers on the edge of the
table. He looked like he might be deciding between standing up and yelling,
which would not be out of character, and bolting from the room, which would.
The worst part was, Stiles couldn't tell which impulse was winning.
His mother appeared to be remaining calm, but it was clearly costing her
something. Stiles wished he was sitting close enough to her to take her hand,
though whether it would have been to steady her or himself, he couldn't say for
certain.
"Men," he said, "I won't have you holding this dinner hostage with your
questions. My good wife asked for the lot of you to be gentlemen, and you're
going to follow that request. Understood?"
There was a general murmuring of assent, and the heavyset officer even added a
sheepish, "Begging your pardon, ma'am."
"Not at all," she replied smoothly, rising from the table. "May I offer anyone
a piece of blackberry pie?"
Stiles followed his mother into the kitchen, carrying dishes without being
asked, mostly because he couldn't abide being in the room with
those strangers, all of whom seemed to know something about his father that he
didn't. His mother's mouth was a thin line, and when he moved in close enough
to speak to her without anyone in the other room hearing, she gave one short
shake of her head.
It was enough to force him to hold his damned tongue, but when he tried his
mother's pie it tasted no better than old potatoes. When he asked to be excused
from the table, his father dismissed him without looking at him.
It was warm enough that Stiles didn't need a coat, which was good, because he
was almost certain he wouldn't be going back to his house tonight. There was
room in the stable, but Stiles wasn't ready to be inside yet. He headed
straight through the cornfield toward Indian Boulder.
The moon was high, but Stiles didn't need it to find his way there. The
relationship between the field, the trees and the hill were as much a part of
him as anything on the earth. Tonight, however, he felt like he wasn't sure
what he could count on feeling familiar. Too much had been shoved out of place.
He knew it wasn't the time for him to ask questions, not yet, but he wasn't
sure what else to do with his fool self in the meantime, other than sit on the
rock in the moonlight and swat mosquitoes away until his overactive mind grew
too tired to do anything but sleep.
Stiles wasn't there for more than ten minutes before he became aware of another
presence nearby. It startled him, because he hadn't heard anyone else
approaching, and there was no easy way to get to Indian Boulder without
stepping on something crunchy or crackly in the underbrush, especially this
late in the summer. He felt a prickle all across the skin of his neck and arms,
a shiver of gooseflesh in the warm evening.
"Who goes there?" he called, his voice cracking. It almost never did that
anymore, except to tell on him when he was most anxious.
The figure emerged over the nose of the rock, still moving silently. Stiles was
doubly startled to see it was Major Hale.
"You're not used to seeing others here," he said. Hale's voice was low and
somewhat hoarse, as though he'd been shouting recently.
Stiles wasn't sure how to respond to that. He shook his head. Hale approached
him carefully, watching him out of the corner of his eye, in the same way that
Stiles himself would sidle up to Ebenezer when the stallion was feeling ornery.
"I come out here to be by myself," said Stiles. "To think. It's... I have time,
here."
It came out awkwardly, but Hale didn't seem to think it was, or if he did, he
didn't say. He simply nodded, crouching down on his heels beside Stiles, elbows
balanced on his knees.
"May I join you?" he asked politely.
Again, Stiles was startled, but he nodded, and Hale shifted to sit on the rock
beside him, looking more comfortable than Stiles would have expected an officer
of the United States Army to look in the middle of someone's family's farm.
Hale just watched the night sky, seeming content to sit without talking. It
made Stiles feel restless. He cast about for something to say.
"Until dinner, I'd thought you and the other officers had come to recruit my
father into the Union army."
Hale's lip twitched. He glanced down at his lap. "Not precisely."
"You called him Colonel." Stiles watched Hale's face. "But my father's never
served in uniform."
"You're mistaken." Hale met his eyes. Stiles was arrested by the intensity of
his gaze, and he just stared back, more curious than confused. "He was promoted
to lieutenant colonel in the year 1851, after which he resigned his
commission."
Eleven years before. Stiles grasped for memories of his five-year-old self, and
the place they'd lived before moving to Maryland and purchasing the farm.
"He... was gone often," he said slowly. "When we were in Hampton. My mother,
she..." He shook his head, feeling muddled.
Hale nodded encouragingly. He sat forward, close enough now to brush Stiles's
shoulder with the sleeve of his jacket. "My understanding is that he made a
decision to choose his family over his country. An honorable choice, and one
many men have made before." His gaze sharpened. Stiles felt himself losing
control of his senses, as though, with each moment, Hale's penetrating stare
was leaching his will from him. "Brigadier-General Wool's decision to come
here, to the Lieutenant Colonel's house, speaks to the Army's need for leaders.
He wouldn't be asking if it weren't crucial. Your father... he was a great
man."
"My father is a great man," Stiles snapped. Hale's head jerked back, his eyes
widening. "I don't need to know his rank to tell me that about him. And he'll
go on being a great man long after you sons of bitches leave."
"Stiles," Hale said. His voice was quiet, full of grave regret, but also
determination. Stiles couldn't bear to hear Major Hale's voice saying his name
that way. He thrust out a hand to to scramble to his feet, but when Hale
intercepted him, he slipped and fell back to the rock again. Hale was there,
using his body to shield Stiles from the collision with the boulder, clutching
him safely to his chest.
"Let me go!" Stiles cried, struggling, but it was like trying to get out from
under the press of a wagonload of sand. "Damn you, let me go or I'll -"
"Stiles," Hale said again, with more force, and Stiles felt himself collapse,
folding in on himself as though he were no more substantial than a piece of
paper. The sound that came out of his mouth wasn't another curse, nor an
accusation, but a sob, followed by another and another, too numerous and
overwhelming to avoid.
Stiles thought vaguely that he should have been horrified to be weeping like an
infant in front of this stranger. Hale was a major in the United States Army,
and he knew Stiles' father history better than Stiles did - and, all right,
perhaps his eyes did strange and inexplicable things to Stiles' insides - but
at the moment, Stiles felt more grateful than embarrassed at the support of
Hale's arms. Stiles dug his forehead into Hale's chest and raged for several
long minutes, and Hale just held him tighter, warm and silent and strong.
By the time his tears had waned, however, Stiles' entire body was pressed up
against Hale's, from neck to groin. And Stiles was - Stiles had -
"Begging your pardon," he whispered, feeling the embarrassment crest and
overwhelm the gratitude.
But Hale remained holding him, not moving away. He was watching Stiles with the
most indescribable expression. It did not appear to be anything like fear or
disgust or even disappointment, but rather held the light of understanding.
Stiles sat there in Hale's arms, experiencing for the first time the embrace of
a man other than his father, and considered his body's traitorous response. And
Hale...
"Well," breathed Hale, the word landing on his face like a gentle slap. Stiles
twisted away, whimpering.
"Major Hale," he began, but Hale put a palm on his chest, resting it there,
effectively sandwiching Stiles between his two hands.
"Derek."
Stiles was paying more attention to Hale's hands than his words. It was
becoming increasingly hard to think about anything other than wrapping his
limbs around Hale's. Some part of Stiles wondered how he could be wanting such
a thing, but that part was effectively silenced by the trembling awareness in
his core. It had no rational thoughts, but wished for nothing more than to find
a rhythm against Hale's firm thigh. He blew out a breath. "I - what?"
"I'm Derek." Hale shifted the hand behind Stiles' back, loosening his hold, as
though by declaring his name, he was putting the walls back where they should
have been. Stiles straightened up, his skin prickling with the loss of contact.
"Stiles," he muttered. "Just Stiles. No one uses my given name, less'n they
want a whipping."
Hale's - Derek's - hands were off him now, and that made Stiles even more
uncomfortable, feeling the situation those hands had wrought in him, both in
body and in soul. Stiles crossed his arms over his chest, thinking he should
leave - and reluctant to be the one to go. Derek should leave, he thought
stubbornly. After all, this is my land, my farm.
"Stiles," Derek said a third time. This time, he was holding the name in his
hands, on his lips. Stiles found himself watching Derek's lips, wondering when
in tarnation all these parts of another man's body had gotten so jo-fired
interesting. The boulder under his behind felt softer than he did right now.
You're doing something to me. It was another admission one didn't make to a
stranger, even if it had to be obvious to Derek that yes, he was. Even more, it
was confounding to Stiles that Derek was responding, too.
"Why didn't he tell me?" he said instead.
Derek looked away. "Only your father can tell you that for certain. Suffice it
to say there are reasons to keep secrets. Surely you have lived enough years to
understand that." He glanced sideways at Stiles.
"I've never had a secret to keep before," Stiles said. He watched Derek blink.
"Never?" Derek said. Stiles shook his head. Now Derek looked completely off-
balance. He paused, then rose to his feet, heading for the edge of the boulder.
"I should be on my way..."
"Please," Stiles called. It was a good thing Derek stopped, or else Stiles was
pretty sure he would have started crying again. "I can't... I don't want you to
go. Just... stay. Please."
Derek's hands clenched into fists. Stiles kept his eyes on the tendons in
Derek's neck above his collar, the way they twisted and coiled, like an animal
ready to spring. He realized suddenly that he wanted to put his mouth on those
tendons, to feel their taut strength. He should have been appalled at himself,
but the adrenaline rushing through him was driving him to more extreme
possibilities than that.
He thought, with a horrifying rush of awareness, this... this must be what
soldiers feel when they're at war.
Stiles walked to stand behind Derek, resting his hands on his broad back, and
reveled in the noise Derek made, throaty and broken. He breathed it in. Derek's
response was the sustenance he'd never known he'd needed before that moment,
and he wanted more.
"I don't know why I want it," he said, "but I do. And don't tell me I'm too
young, because -"
"No," Derek said, the word barely a sigh. He turned his head slightly, far
enough for Stiles to see the curve of his cheekbone. "No, I won't tell you
that. I'm only guessing at your age, but I remember all too well how it was for
me when I was a youth. To want a thing you'd been told a man... shouldn't
want."
"But you do," Stiles whispered, like a plea. "You do."
Derek turned around the rest of the way, facing him. Stiles dropped his hands,
returning them to his sides, but Derek reached for them, making Stiles shiver
and shrink back.
"I know what I am," he said. "I'm not like ordinary men."
"Neither am I," Stiles countered. He'd never been more certain of that before
this moment. He had perhaps had inklings of this tendency, but now that Derek's
hands had awakened him, it was not even a question.
"No." Derek reached up and brushed Stiles' cheek with the back of one hand.
That was almost a smile on his face. Stiles felt dizzy. "No, I mean... I'm
under a curse. Me, my sister, my whole family."
Stiles licked his lips. He could tell Derek was not talking about the strange
and wonderful attraction between them. That this curse, whatever it was, was
something else. "Oh."
"We all have it." Derek's eyes were hooded. "It makes us stronger, faster. We
become... monsters. It makes us very effective soldiers, but... it's not
pretty."
Pretty. It was not a suitable word for a man as rugged and manly as Derek Hale,
but Stiles would not have denied Derek's face was, in many ways, the prettiest
he'd ever seen. He mirrored Derek's action, touching his face with tentative
fingertips, and watched him react with rising anticipation.
"What happens?" Stiles asked.
Derek grasped Stiles' hand in his, and pressed it to his mouth, kissing the
wrist as he watched Stiles' face. Now Stiles was the one to respond with an
involuntary groan.
"The demon takes over." Derek's voice was low with regret and other things that
Stiles could barely guess at. "Trust me, you don't want to see."
Stiles shook his head. "I don't care."
For a long moment, Derek gazed into Stiles' face, his fingers gently carding
through Stiles' hair. It was waking up all the skin on his neck, a sensation
that slowly spread to the rest of his body. He closed his eyes, letting himself
feel, just to feel the touch of another man, and to appreciate exactly how much
that meant to him.
When he opened them again, Derek was smiling. "Extraordinary," he murmured,
tracing the curve of Stiles' ear. "I believe you actually mean that."
Stiles nodded wordlessly. Derek's contact was putting him into a kind of stupor
from which he was having a hard time recovering. At the same time, he
recognized that the things he wanted most were things he shouldn't be asking
for - not from any man, but especially not from an important man like Major
Hale. He knew, also, that the stiffness in his pants wasn't the same as being
piss proud, as he was sometimes when he awoke, but he couldn't imagine how he
might ask Derek to help him deal with that. The very thought made him stagger.
"I think," Stiles said, trying to put words into sentences, "people will be
looking for you pretty soon."
"Stiles," Derek said. It was the fourth time he'd said his name, and this one
was perhaps the hardest to hear of all, because it held promises, and Stiles
wanted more than anything to hear them. But Derek just stepped back with a
sigh, nodding. "I don't - I'm not here to ask anything of you."
Stiles laughed. "Oh, trust me, there ain't nothing you could ask of me right
now that I don't want to give you. I just don't have any clue about how to do
that."
Derek's stunned expression made Stiles laugh harder. He couldn't help sneaking
a look at the lap of Derek's trousers, to where the buttoned fabric was
stretched taut over what looked to be something larger than what he himself
possessed. He shrugged helplessly while Derek retreated toward the edge of the
boulder.
"There are others, like us," Derek said. "You're not alone. Now that you know
what you're looking for, you'll have an easier time of it, finding those who
want... the things you want."
What I want is standing right before me, he wanted to say. He wanted to put his
hands back on Derek's face and never stop touching him. He wanted to feel more
of that skin, the way Derek's fingers were waking him up. He wanted to taste
him, the sweat of him, to bury his nose into Derek's neck and inhale his scent.
But he didn't dare do any of those things.
"All right," he said.
Derek gave a firm nod, then turned and stepped off the edge of the rock. It
wasn't a short fall to the ridge below, but as Stiles scrambled down after him,
he could see that Derek was walking away as though he'd just done something as
simple as leap across two stepping stones in Hardpan Creek.
"Hey," he called. Derek paused, turning to look at him, and Stiles hurried to
catch up. He took a deep breath and reached out a hand, resting it on Derek's
arm. "Thank you. For telling me the truth."
He didn't specify which truth in particular, but Derek's nod seemed to cover
all of them. "You're very welcome, Stiles."
Derek didn't appear to need any help finding his way back in the dark. Stiles
walked with him anyway, asking him all the ordinary questions while they
walked, about his family (two sisters and a mother living in Vermont, and an an
uncle serving in the Navy), how he'd grown up (raised by his mother, traveling
between Britain and the United States), his journey from commissioned
lieutenant to major (quick and dirty, because, as Derek said, "They needed
officers like they needed rations"). He didn't actually pay much attention to
the content of what Derek said, just as long as he was able to walk beside him
and listen to him talk, and occasionally bump against him with his shoulder as
they went.
The ordinary questions distracted Stiles from asking the things
he really wanted to know, like when did you discover you lusted after men this
way, the way men are supposed to lust after women? and what's it like to lie
with a man, and what do you do?
The closer they drew to the house, however, the quieter Derek got. When, too
soon, they spied the light shining out of the front window, Derek stopped
walking and stared at the farm, scowling. Stiles couldn't decide if that
expression was distressing or captivating.
"What's troubling you?" he asked.
"This." Derek gestured at the fence, where Barnaby was perched, for once placid
and drowsy. Stiles tilted his head at the rooster.
"Well, he's ornery and brash as all get out, but I don't think Barnaby's gonna
do anything -"
"This," Derek repeated impatiently, grabbing Stiles' shoulder and cutting off
his words with a firm shake. "Stiles... this stops here. Nothing is going to
come of - what happened on the rock. Do you understand?"
Stiles felt all the motion in his body slow, like clockwork winding down, and
grind to a halt, until he was left staring at Derek's hand holding his
shoulder. That answered the question Stiles had been most afraid to ask: are
these simply the desires of the flesh, or is there more than that here?
Because Stiles knew about lust. He'd felt it wake in him almost daily for the
past four years, knew how it could haunt his dreams and leave him gasping and
wet in the middle of the night. And he had heard the hired hands talking about
what coarse men did with women who let them. This... didn't feel like that. It
was true he'd no experience to teach him, but he knew rather a lot about
trusting his heart. And his heart was telling him something loud and clear and
terrifying about Derek Hale.
But now Derek was saying, in no uncertain terms, that it didn't matter one
donkey's fart what his heart was telling him, because Stiles wasn't going to
get what he wanted.
Stiles did the only thing he could do: he nodded. Then he broke away from
Derek's hand and made a beeline for the side door of the stable, ducking into
the unoccupied stall beside Harriet, and crouched in the musty straw. There, he
waited for his heart to slow its wild, ragged rhythm.
He's just a man, he told himself, in the midst of a brutal spate of
tears. There's nothing here that matters. He's going to leave, and everything
will be... the same again.
"Stiles?" he heard, and he sniffed, trying desperately to control his crying.
It obviously wasn't Derek, unless Derek had suddenly learned how to modify his
voice to sound like a middle-aged matron.
"Here," he called back. A moment later, his mother appeared, peering over the
stall door, lit by the lantern she carried.
"I wanted you to know there's still room in the house, if you'd prefer to sleep
there," she said. "The officers are settled on bedrolls on the floor in the
loft, and I gave the brigadier-general your bed, but there is space for you in
the kitchen. In truth, I would not blame you one tiny bit if this suited you
better tonight." She smiled wryly. "I think I might prefer it, myself, if the
house were not currently in such dire need of a female's voice of reason."
Stiles nodded again. "Thank you, mother." He couldn't tell her no, not when
she'd been so kind to him. He watched her sigh, though, and felt guilty
anyway. For being myself. For wanting something she can't understand. For
resenting her for keeping the truth from me.
"It's not only that," she said. "I imagine you have questions. I'm here to
answer as many as I can. Although perhaps tonight is not the best time."
"Just..." He fished for anything he could ask that would explain the situation
to his satisfaction, anything at all. "Father. Why did he resign his
commission?" When she hesitated, eyes fixed on the table, he added hesitantly,
"Was it - was he... ashamed?"
"To be a soldier?" She shook her head firmly. "No. Stiles, no. It was me. I
insisted he put his family first. He wanted to remain in the reserves, to
maintain his promise to his country, but I would have none of it. I was too
anxious to return to my family's farm here in Maryland and make a life for us."
Even in the darkness of the barn, Stiles could see her face was tinged with
regret. "I was selfish."
"Selfish?"
She inclined her head, like a prayer. "When you're just starting out together
as man and wife... it hurts to be apart. Even after six years of marriage, it
was thus with your father. His time away from us, drilling and training, felt
like the biggest sacrifice I could be asked to make. I didn't yet understand
what it meant to be a good wife, to be patient and to trust my husband to make
the decisions that would care for his family. All I could see was his absence,
and not what I could make of it."
Her words were soft, wistful, sounding not at all like his own practical
mother. Stiles didn't remember a time when she had been so forthcoming with
details about her own state. It made him feel a little strange to hear her, but
he was pleased, too, to be granted such an accord, as though he were himself an
adult.
He struggled to remember significant details of his father from his early
childhood, to no avail. "He wasn't there much. When I was small."
"He had his own duty to fulfill." His mother didn't look away. "As he may
choose to do again."
"Mother." He stared back. "Father can't go with the soldiers."
"I have told him I won't tell him no again. It is his decision. It has been all
along."
"But - the farm! How could he just leave that to -" Stiles stopped, aghast.
Now her eyes flashed impatience. "You're nearly a man, Stiles. And don't tell
me you underestimate my capacity to manage in his absence. I've done it
before."
That wasn't it, and she knew he knew it. They were both capable of doing the
practical things to keep the farm going, when his father was busy with other
things. No, it was the rush of icy fear at the idea of being expected to grow
up, just like that.
"I'm not ready," he insisted. "He wouldn't choose that. Not without talking to
me first."
"Stiles..." His mother sounded weary. "Your father's concerns are larger than
you, or this farm. I'm saying you'd best be ready for that possibility, with or
without conversation from him." Her shadow flickered, long and distorted, on
the wall of the barn as she turned. "I won't expect you back at the house until
morning, but I'll leave blankets for you in the kitchen if you change your
mind."
Stiles listened to the quiet shuffle of his mother's steps through the straw,
then the squeak of the door hinge, and then he was in darkness once more.
Somehow this darkness seemed more ominous. Perhaps it was because now Stiles
knew what might come of the soldiers' visit. What else might come of it, he
amended, remembering Derek's hand brushing his cheek. It made him shiver. The
speed at which his world was changing was truly dizzying. He felt like he'd
been knocked around by a sound set of punches to the head; whilst he was
reeling from one blow, the next was sneaking up on him from the opposite side.
He gritted his teeth. Well, Stiles, you can either huddle up under cover of
your own arms and try to withstand the assault like a scared little boy, or you
can brace for the next round and get ready to fight back like a man.
It was a lonely place to be. Not the barn; the barn felt safe and familiar,
with Harriet stamping and whickering in the stall beside him, the mild smell of
cow and straw and grain blanketing his abused senses. No, it was lonely knowing
that, whatever happened, he had no control over the outcome - but would have to
be responsible for it just the same. There was no one to hold his hand and tell
him it would be all right. He would have to tell himself.
That was Stiles' breaking point. And because he was alone, he felt no
compunction about indulging in a completely undignified, juvenile temper
tantrum. He didn't kick the walls of the barn, nor yell, because that would
scare the animals, but instead balled his fists by his ears and wound himself
into a taut, seething mass on the floor of the stable. He thought things no boy
should think about his own father, not if his father had treated him with
fairness and respect, as his always had. He raged, as quietly as he could, at
the utter injustice of the world, even as he rolled his own eyes at himself for
doing so.
When the hand touched his back, he supposed he should have been startled, but
the truth of the matter was he'd been lying there with his hands cradling his
head, letting the pain wash over him and wishing so desperately for someone,
anyone to hear him. The touch felt like an answer to his prayers, and he rolled
into it, squeezing his eyes tight as the arms enfolded him.
"I'm sorry," Derek whispered, sounding penitent, "I'm so sorry, I couldn't stay
away, not when you were - please, forgive me."
"No," Stiles replied immediately, interrupting him, "no, don't tell me you're
sorry, just - I can't do this alone, I don't know how."
He felt rough, dry lips on his cheekbone, the corner of his mouth. "You're not
alone."
Derek's kiss left him stunned, and Stiles heard himself whimper, turning his
head blindly in the dark, seeking more. The next kiss met his chin, and then
his upper lip, and then his mouth, open and wanting. The sound that came out of
Derek was more animal than human.
"I shouldn't," he said.
"Yes," Stiles said vehemently, "yes, you should. Please, I need -"
He needed something, and not knowing what to do to get it was killing him a
little bit. He kissed Derek back, feeling the way in which their mouths fit
together, and Derek's hungry response. It was a revelation, to know that lips
touching could make a body feel like that, could reach down inside and yank up
the floor on the world and upend it, like a basket of acorns. He was scattered
on the floor, and Derek was collecting him, one by one, and putting him back
where he belonged.
"Come here," Derek said, shifting Stiles off the floor and onto his knees,
facing him. His touches were tentative. Stiles could tell how much he was
holding back.
"You're not going to hurt me," he insisted. "I want it."
It was too dark to see, but he could hear Derek's frustration. "You don't know
what I'm capable of."
"Show me."
Stiles was only vaguely aware of what he was asking for, but the voice inside
him screaming for more, now, please knew what he wanted, even if the rest of
him didn't have a sense in the world. Derek's lips moved to Stiles' neck,
kissing hungrily, then more aggressively. He felt Derek's arms tighten
abruptly, and heard a low growl.
"Oh," he whined, pressing in harder against Derek's blunt teeth, "sweet
merciful Jesus."
"Stiles," said a different voice. It was still clearly Derek's, but much
harsher and more distorted than his ordinary one. "Don't be afraid. I won't
hurt you."
Stiles felt his own arms around Derek's broad back, the way Derek was holding
him, even as he shook and strained against him. "I know," he said. "I know you
won't."
"All right." Derek sat back, just far enough for Stiles to feel their breath
between them. "Touch my face. Feel what I have become."
It took him a few moments to decide it was still Derek's face, because
everything had changed. There were ridges where a minute ago there had been
smooth planes, and hair sprouted from every feature, not just along his jaw.
Stiles traced the exaggerated brow, the pointed ears. When he brought his hand
around to touch Derek's lips, his fingers caught on sharp teeth. It was another
several moments before he could speak.
"My mother told me a story when I was a boy about a little girl in a cloak,
going to her grandmother's house, and along the way she met a - an animal." He
swallowed. "A wolf."
"Yes." Derek sounded bitter now. "I am not unlike that animal."
Stiles hesitated only briefly before touching his cheek to Derek's. Derek
sucked in a breath.
"You are, though," Stiles whispered. "You're not an animal. You have nobility
and compassion. You're a moral person. No animal can exhibit such things."
"I'm not thinking about any of those things, Stiles," Derek said desperately.
He applied firm pressure to Stiles' shoulder, until Stiles was flat on his back
on the floor and Derek was kneeling over him. "All I want to do is -"
"Is what?" Stiles demanded.
Abruptly, Derek's entire body thrust against Stiles. The motion Derek made with
his hips caused Stiles to cry out and thrust back.
"To use you," he snarled. "To take your innocence from you. To make you mine.
Tell me, is that not the act of an animal?"
With each phrase, Derek crushed him more firmly to the floor, rocking slowly
into him. Stiles could feel the pressure along the length of his hardness, but
also lower, and inside. Inside me, Stiles thought, with breath-stealing
revelation. Inside me. Oh.
"Animals mate to procreate," Stiles said, as calmly and steadily as he could
manage. "I don't believe that is your goal. You're not scaring me, do you
hear?" Inside me, he wanted to say, to beg for it. However that might be
possible, he had no idea, but his desire was beyond rational thought.
Another low growl rippled out of Derek, and lingered there behind his voice,
like an echo. "Oh, animals take pleasure from one another. I have no doubt I
could make you feel... things you've never felt before."
"Yes," he begged, and heard Derek mutter a curse. He shifted lower, thrusting
harder against Stiles' abdomen, his thigh, and when Stiles spread his legs in
response, Derek placed a palm over the center of him, pressing with two fingers
into the fabric of his trousers. Stiles gasped, feeling the way his body
clenched in response, understanding at last. "Yes, like that, oh -"
"I should not," Derek said again, his voice pained, but he did not move his
hands away. "It's irresponsible and selfish in the highest degree. You deserve
more than a toss in the hay, Stiles."
"Don't care, don't care," Stiles chanted, "do that again, do that again."
Derek's fingers obliged, grinding up against him again, making circles of
pressure that left him scrambling at the buttons of his trousers. It was too
good to feel like pain, but the impossibility of what he was imagining was
enough to give him pause, and he stopped after the buttons were undone.
"Stiles," Derek said again, and now his voice sounded normal again. Stiles used
his fingers to map Derek's features a second time. He felt only the familiar
contours of a human face. It was no more or less appealing to him than the
monster had been. "This is something I have no right to take."
"Yes. Yes, you do." He cupped Derek's face in both hands and kissed him, the
way Derek had kissed, and felt a rush of pleasure at the way Derek moaned his
approval. "Because you're taking something that I'm giving you freely. I'm
giving you that right. Make -" He could barely say the words, they felt so
foreign and improbable, and had to take a full breath in and out before he
could finish the sentence. "-make me yours."
Derek's hand slid down Stiles' stomach again, tucking into the gap in his
trousers. Each touch was like a new possibility: his belly, the shaft of his
hard prick, the skin of his thighs, the sensitive sac, the twitching opening
between his legs. Five seconds ago, no one had ever touched him in any of those
places - and now, Derek had, Derek who was kneeling over him again, tearing off
his surcoat and his vest to unbutton his shirt.
"You're certain this is what you want?" Derek asked - but his voice was telling
Stiles, want this, like a demand.
"I've never felt more certain about anything in my life." Stiles made a move to
help, but Derek put a hand on his chest, preventing him from sitting up.
"Please," he said, "let me." With one effortless motion, Derek lifted Stiles'
body in one arm and shimmied his breeches off with the other, followed by
Stiles' sweaty trousers. He laid them in the straw beneath him, depositing
Stiles atop them, kneeling between his legs. "Tell me if it's not what you
want."
I want, Stiles thought, restraining an hysterical giggle. "I swear I will.
Please, do that again, what you were - oh."
The warm wetness that surrounded the head of his prick was entirely unexpected.
Stiles had handled himself before, sometimes spitting into his palm to aid with
the friction, but this was magnitudes more intense. He put an unsteady hand
down to feel Derek's curls brushing against his skin as his head bobbed, and
the image that formed in his mind was enough to accelerate him to
hyperventilation. "Wait - for the love of - Derek, wait."
Derek sat back, his bare shoulders barely visible in the darkness of the barn.
"Is it not pleasurable?"
"In truth, I have never felt anything more," Stiles said, his voice shaky. He
heard Derek's relieved sigh, and a brief chuckle, as he ran his hands along
Stiles' calves and up the inside of his thighs before bowing his head once
again.
"You may want to reserve judgment until I am done."
Stiles meant to say that it was too good, that what Derek was doing was going
to result in him filling Derek's mouth with fluid, and he couldn't imagine that
would be either pleasant or desirable - but what Derek did next was surprising
enough to wipe the words from his mouth, replacing them with a whimper.
"If I am to take you in this way," Derek said, his voice muffled by his
actions, "you must be ready for me. Open, and... and slick. This is the best
way to attain that, without oil or similar substances."
Stiles was not complaining, not in the least, but he caught the word slick and
hung on to it. "Petrolatum," he gasped. "In the medical kit, for the horses and
sheep - if you need it."
Derek sat back again. "Yes. Get it."
Stopping that kind of stimulation was almost worse than anything, but Stiles
stumbled through the dim stable to the first aid box, naked from the waist
down, his hard prick waving before him like a testimony to Derek's effect on
him. He was glad no one was there to witness it.
"Here," he said softly as he returned, hesitating outside the stall. He both
wished that he could see Derek's face, and was grateful for the cover of
darkness. But Derek came right to him, embracing him as he took the glass jar
of petrolatum out of his fingers. Stiles could feel Derek had undone his own
trouser buttons. Although he wanted to, Stiles did not have the courage to
touch him.
"You're frightened," Derek said.
Stiles nodded reluctantly. "How did you know?"
"The same way I could tell you were so distraught, when you went to the stable.
I can hear your every move; smell you, sense your emotions. It's part of the
curse." Derek nosed through his hair, along his neck, and it was so much like
Harriet whuffling for an apple that Stiles laughed despite himself.
"It's amazing," he said. "A stronger soldier with miraculous senses. More like
a blessing than a curse. At least for the Union Army."
"Most men do not agree with you. Although my uncle does, and he suffers from
the same affliction as I. He says it is a gift."
A gift, Stiles' mind repeated, marveling at Derek's body under his hands. You
are the gift. Standing there before him, Stiles could feel Derek's unbuttoned
breeches against his bare legs, and the light fur of Derek's back under his
hands as they kissed, awkward and slow and painfully sweet. With each breath
they took, Stiles felt more of the stress and strain of the moment leave him,
until his fears had fled and he was shaking once again with the demand
of inside me. Most of his fears, anyway.
"Will it hurt?" Stiles asked.
Derek held him closer, kissing his forehead, his hair, his temple. "Perhaps a
little," he said. "I do not intend it to. And I will stop, if you ask me. No
matter how much my animal may snarl and fight it, I will not subjugate you to
its base longings without insuring you the freedom to say no."
Stiles smiled. "I can understand why you're fighting for the Union."
"No man deserves to be owned by another without his consent." Derek returned
Stiles to his bed of clothes on straw. He brushed Stiles' hair back, supporting
his neck with one hand. "My only goal is to give you pleasure, and to take mine
from you. I swear I am not asking... anything else of you."
Stiles turned his head so that his ear was pressed to Derek's neck, listening
to the pulse of blood in Derek's veins, feeling Derek's beard scratching his
face. "This... taking. What you were doing before, with your - your mouth, your
tongue."
"Yes. If I may continue?"
Stiles felt the beard on his lips, moving them to Derek's ear. "Do you want
that from me? My mouth, my tongue, like that?"
Derek's breath was coming faster now, and as Stiles dared to kiss his earlobe,
he made a tantalizingly desperate sound. "Are you telling me you wish to be the
one to do the taking?"
The idea was compelling, Stiles had to admit, and a little heady, but if he was
going to be honest... he shook his head. "I just wanted to make certain. That I
could be selfish, like this, and that you would not feel like I was requiring
too much of you."
"Oh, sweet boy," Derek whispered. His next kiss was more forceful, and Stiles
lost himself in it. "You're not requiring too much. I'm the one blessed to be
here, in this moment, beneficiary of your generosity and trust. I will endeavor
not to let you down."
Stiles hadn't felt one moment of real fear since Derek had first touched him
earlier that night, on Indian Boulder. On the contrary, he was surging with
relief at the way Derek was handling him. It was the most freedom he could
recall feeling, ever. His heart was full, full to bursting, his skin alive and
tingling, his body opening willingly to the press of Derek's fingers, slick
with petrolatum. Derek had been right, there was a little pain, but it was
folded inside the exquisite experience of Derek's mouth around him, and the
anticipation of something even more amazing just on the horizon.
"Oh," he kept saying, and "yes," whenever something felt especially good, and
"again," when he couldn't help himself. Stiles realized he'd abandoned every
bit of shame or embarrassment he might have felt about doing these acts when he
found himself reaching down with both hands to spread himself wider,
asking please, please, harder, deeper.
Derek used no words, but Stiles didn't think he needed any. He could tell when
Derek changed again, his voice resuming that gritty, breathy growl. Stiles
thought other things might have changed as well, but he was so overstimulated
by that point that it didn't really matter.
Derek slowed several times, and every time Stiles whined his disapproval. The
last time, he begged him, "No, please, don't stop -"
"So close," Derek said through gritted teeth, "if you want me to keep going,
I'm trying, but this is - and you're so..." He groaned, reaching between them
for Stiles' prick and setting up a firm, determined rhythm. "So beautiful."
The words were astonishing, but even more incredible was the realization
that Stiles had moved Derek to say them. Stiles almost missed the warning signs
of his own conclusion, until the pleasure had spiraled up through his center
and it was almost too late for him to do anything but give in to Derek's hand
on him, and repeat oh, oh, over and over.
Derek snarled ferociously enough to set Ebenezer snorting. "Come on. I'll be
damned if I'm going to finish before you."
He did not, but only just barely.
It took Stiles several minutes to recover his senses. The first was the dull
ache inside him, followed by the chafing along his thighs, and then the quivery
fluttering of his abused stomach muscles, and - oh, yes, there was the shame
and embarrassment, back to fill the new empty space inside, the space that
Derek had wrought. He could not imagine it being filled by anyone else.
Derek did not stray far from Stiles while he breathed, and although he left a
cushion of air between their sweaty bodies, he did not seem to want to move his
hand from Stiles' chest, resting over his heart. Stiles eventually moved his
own hand atop Derek's, holding it there, just to let him know that was okay,
that that was exactly what he wanted.
He lay back on the straw, staring up at the ceiling, and eventually realized
something else. "You can see me?"
"In the dark. Yes."
Stiles wasn't sure that was exactly what he'd meant. He tried again. "And at
other times? You... saw me, on Indian Boulder. Before this. Before I even knew
what I wanted myself. Could you tell, about me?"
Derek shook his head. "I didn't think about that when I came to you. I just
knew you were in pain, and I had to do what I could to help."
"Why?" Stiles turned toward him, wishing even more now that he could see
Derek's expression.
Derek did not reply, but he leaned over and kissed Stiles, and that was all the
invitation Stiles needed to eliminate the space between them. Kissing Derek was
still appealing, even now that the rutting drive had quieted, and they did that
for some time before another question surfaced in Stiles' brain.
"Do you remember how the story ends? The one about the wolf and the girl in the
cloak?"
Derek let out a soft sigh. "In the version I have heard most frequently, the
wolf consumes the girl, after which she is rescued by a passing woodsman who
hears her cries."
"What if she did not want to be rescued?"
He shifted. "I doubt she would have had that choice -"
"What if, now that you have - consumed me, I wish to remain inside you when you
go? To be part of you? What would you say to that?"
Derek was silent for ten long heartbeats, though he did not move away, and
Stiles did not think he was upset by the question. Finally, he spoke. "I would
say first, you are a boy, and a boy needs his freedom. I would not ask you to
give that up. And second, war takes its toll on a country, and civil war more
than most. I do not know if I will come back."
The answer was honest and should have come as no surprise to Stiles, but in his
mind's eye, he could abruptly see his father as well as Derek, both so plainly,
dropping on the battlefield to a bayonet or rifle fire. He clutched at Derek's
back, and Derek gathered him up in his arms, as though Stiles weighed no more
than a falling leaf.
"I regret this, Stiles," he said, with heavy sorrow. "It is the truth. This was
as unexpected for me as it was for you. I have lived my life unattached,
because it was safer that way. I had no intention of... my heart becoming
involved."
Stiles felt his own heart leap at the words, wiping his eyes. "But now it is?"
He felt Derek's nod against his cheek, and turned his face to kiss him again.
"I feel it is a weakness to admit such a thing, and yet I cannot deny it."
"You said no man deserves to be owned by another without his consent." He
rested his head on the curve of Derek's shoulder. "What if I would offer that
consent?"
Derek paused. "Stiles..."
"I know you cannot promise to return," he went on insistently, "but neither can
I see my life picking up and going on as it was after you depart. My heart will
follow you, whether you will it or no."
It was Derek's turn to grip Stiles hard, his nose pressed in against Stiles'
neck. "Waking to desire is not the end of your journey, Stiles. It is just the
beginning for you. Do not make of this a tragedy."
"I didn't say it was one." He intertwined his fingers with Derek's and gripped
them, hard. "You're leaving in the morning, and you're probably taking my
father with you, and - and I'm still smiling."
"And weeping," Derek agreed. "Smiling and weeping, both. It is madness." He
pulled Stiles astride his body, stretched out as though on a plank, holding him
securely. "I would not leave you until dawn."
"I'd be much obliged," Stiles murmured, closing his eyes.
Sleep ebbed and flowed through the night, claiming them both for brief periods,
but Stiles found himself unable to keep his hands off Derek each time he woke.
Derek roused whenever Stiles touched him, with the habits of a soldier, and not
one time did he object, not even when the grey light crept over them like a
warning.
At dawn, Stiles listened to the cows knocking against the wall of the barn, and
Barnaby beginning his morning serenade. "I'm late for the milking."
"You'll be wanted by more than cattle soon." Derek sat up, and Stiles sat with
him, watching as Derek recovered his shirt from the floor and pulled it on. He
reached out a tentative hand and touched Derek on his bare thigh, watching him
pause and shudder. "You aren't encouraging me to keep on task."
They had coupled twice more in the night - the last time particularly slow and
careful when Stiles realized he was more than a little sore. "I don't know if I
could do it again right now," Stiles admitted. "I'm just touching you. Just to
be sure you're real."
Derek smiled. It quite transformed his face, and Stiles found himself staring.
"Real, indeed. Major Derek Hale, at your service."
"Unbelievable." Stiles shook his head. He moved his hand to all the parts of
Derek's body with which he'd become familiar in the night, looking at every bit
of him, remembering how they'd felt in the dark, and finally to his face, where
Derek cupped his fingers against him.
"If you are in danger of believing yourself deluded by your memory," Derek
said, somewhat hesitantly, "perhaps I... should leave you with... a token.
Something to recall this night."
"You think I'm going to forget?" Stiles scoffed. Then his heart did a slow roll
as he watched Derek grasp the gold ring on the smallest finger of his left
hand, working it carefully over his knuckle. When it was free, Derek took
Stiles' hand and deposited the ring into his palm, closing his fingers over it.
"It belonged to my mother's mother."
"Derek, I can't take this," he protested. Derek went back to buttoning his
shirt.
"Consider it a loan, for safekeeping. As I am holding your heart, until you are
ready to have it back."
Stiles had nothing to say in response. He swallowed hard on the lump in his
throat. The ring fit loosely on his last finger, but he clutched it tight, not
letting it slip over the knuckle as he gathered up his own clothes and pulled
them on.
It stayed there as he did the milking, but he knew he could not wear it on his
hand in front of his father. When Derek approached him from behind, placing
both hands on Stiles' shoulders as he perched on the milking stool, Stiles had
decided on a solution. He turned and handed the ring back to Derek, along with
a piece of string.
"Around my neck?" he said, looking up at him.
Derek just nodded, threading the ring onto the string, and tied it securely
before tucking it into Stiles' shirt. He left his hand there on Stiles' chest
for a few moments, touching the ring, cupping him in a brief embrace. Then he
let go and turned, heading for the door.
Stiles scrambled to his feet, trying not to panic. "You - Derek?"
"We will depart when the brigadier-general is ready," Derek said quietly. "Not
before. But I do not think you and I will have another moment alone before I
go."
Now Stiles' smile was gone. All he felt was miserable, and the look on Derek's
face wasn't much better. Stiles couldn't even bring himself to walk into
Derek's arms; he just waited there, his arms holding himself tight, until Derek
came to him, stroking his shoulders lightly.
"I won't interfere between you and your father," he added, "but you may want to
give him a chance to explain."
They were the last words Derek spoke to him. Stiles did not forget them, any
more than he forgot the gentle embrace that followed, so different from the
passion of the night before. He held on until Derek let him go, accepting his
kisses and caresses with increasing resignation.
Stiles let Derek return to the house while he finished his morning chores, and
by the time he followed him there, the officers were readying their horses for
departure. Stiles' father was among them, wearing a uniform coat Stiles had
certainly never seen before. They were joined shortly thereafter by several
other local farmers, including Heather's father, none of whom seemed surprised
to see his father in uniform.
"I'll send word as soon as I can," his father told his mother, tucking the
package of food she handed him into his smallest saddlebag. She nodded, her
face drawn and quiet, and accepted a kiss before assisting in packing the rest
of the officers' gear on the back of their mule.
Stiles didn't stay to watch them leave. He fled to the ridge, standing at the
base of Indian Boulder, watching the small company make their way across the
valley until they had disappeared from view.
It wasn't that Stiles hadn't wanted to say goodbye, nor to hear his father's
reasons for what he had done; he had. It was that he didn't think he could have
tolerated a moment in Derek's presence without his face plainly revealing what
had happened the night before.
He turned when he heard someone approaching, but was unsurprised to see Heather
struggling through the scrub, joining him beside the rock, her face red and
shiny with tears under her bonnet.
"He told me about your father," she said. "Stiles, I'm so sorry."
"It's okay," he replied, and held out his hand to hold hers, like they were
still ten years old. She took it without a thought.
It took him about two minutes to decide what to do next, mostly because Heather
had always known him better than anyone else. If there was any chance he was
going to make it through the next few weeks, he was going to need a friend who
knew what was going on.
"I met someone," he said.
She rubbed her hand over her face and sniffed. "Someone?" she repeated dully.
He cleared his throat. "I gave... my heart."
"Oh -" Heather's eyes flew open, one hand on her chest. "Stiles!"
"You can't tell anyone," he cautioned her, as she reached for his other hand.
"It remains a secret, for as long as it needs to be."
She stared up at him, nodding. "How? Where?"
"Not here." He glanced up at the rock above them, realizing he was never going
to be able to sit up there again without thinking about Derek. "Come on, help
me up. I'll tell you the whole story."
[Stiles and Derek by containerpark]
===============================================================================
Eleven months later, July 1863
"Six more today," his mother called across the paddock. Stiles paused in
slopping the pigs, wiping the sweat from his neck with the cuff of his shirt,
and squinted into the sun.
"None stopping for dinner?" he called back.
She shook her head. "I sent them on their way once I'd spoken with them. They
didn't look like they had a lick of tolerance in them for conversation, and
when they spoke to one another, every other word was a curse. I'd just as soon
let them find another waystation."
Stiles knew already what his mother was not saying: none of them knew anything
about your father. She'd gotten very good at asking for information without
prying. No one had heard anything about Lieutenant Colonel Stilinski, or even
seemed to know who he was. Stiles did not have to ask if these men had had any
news. He just nodded in silence.
His mind was still on the retreating soldiers when, in the midst of pulling up
another bushel of leeks, he spotted another handful of them, making their way
on foot through the shade along the base of the ridge. It was a common enough
sight that he didn't think much of it, but raised a hand in response to their
far-away greeting and went back to his harvesting - until he heard his name.
"Stiles!"
His heart stopped, and the bushel of leeks spilled into the dirt. He took two
steps toward the soldiers, frantically shading his eyes to see more clearly.
"Who -?"
And then he saw him, leaning on a cane as he limped into view. For a moment,
Stiles wanted to throw his mattock at the ground and curse, because it was
neither his father nor Derek, but that inclination passed quickly enough. He
waved once more, then ran for the house.
"Mother," he shouted, grabbing a jug to fill with water, "I have to get
Heather. It's her father. He's returned from Gettysburg."
It was quicker to climb the hill to get to Heather's farm than it was to go
around, but watching the struggle her father was going through just to walk
along the bottom of the ridge, Stiles wasn't certain her father would be able
to make it over the hill. By the time he returned, the three men had made
minimal progress. He waved again, leaving the water jug in the shade of the
largest beech.
It was a sweltering day, and Stiles wished he'd taken a swig of water himself
by the time he finally reached Heather's yard. She was crouched amid rows of
carrots, frowning at the rabbit-eaten portions of the greens, and looked up in
surprise as he approached.
"Your father's at the bottom of the hill," he said, and she turned white,
rising to her feet.
"Is he -?" she asked immediately, because there were only three reasons for men
to come home in the middle of the war: injury, desertion, or death. He took
Heather's dirty gloved hand, tugging her along.
"He's walking," Stiles said. "Slowly, and with a cane, but he waved at me."
He repeated the same words to Heather's mother and two sisters, who were
preparing dinner inside the house. Her mother went immediately to the stable to
saddle the mare; she was not going to attempt to climb over the hill, but the
three girls followed Stiles back the way he'd come.
Heather did not let go of his hand. She glanced up at him as they approached
the rock, looking apologetic.
"He'll come home, too," she said. "Your father's a busy man. The war's not
over; he still has work to do."
"I know," he replied stoically. "I'm sure you're right."
When they crested the top of the hill, however, they were surprised again by
three smiling faces. The girls descended upon their father, sobbing and kissing
him, and even Heather, who seldom allowed herself displays of emotion, gave in
to tears as she embraced him.
"Can you climb the rest of the hill?" she asked, beaming at him. "It's a
perfect place for a reunion."
===============================================================================
Three years later, May 1866
In the retelling of the story of Heather's father's return, it became Reunion
Hill, and Stiles never had the heart to correct the name after that. Eventually
it felt like that had been its name all along, long after all of the survivors
and deserters had come home. Stiles watched more than one reunion occur in the
vicinity of the hill. The fact that his own never did remained bitterly
disappointing, although Stiles was usually willing to put up with that, over
the course of the days and months and years that passed. People came home;
broken families were joined again. And Stiles and his mother continued to wait.
Periodically, when Stiles and Heather would walk across the field and discover
the small things the soldiers had left behind on their way back to their own
homes, they would tell stories about them.
"He didn't get fitted for spectacles until after he'd joined the Union Army,"
Heather decided, holding up a broken pair of eyeglasses. "At which point he
made the mistake of telling an off-color joke, and a sensitive fellow in his
regiment decked him."
Stiles considered a fifty-cent piece. "Hmmmm... his wife gave him this, telling
him it was lucky, and when he came home from the war, he could use it to buy
his first meal."
"Bad luck for him," Heather agreed, grinning. They swept the ground with their
eyes, walking slowly along the edge of the Stilinski south field. At one point,
she glanced up at Stiles. "Can I ask you something?"
"You know you can."
"Do you think he's going to come back someday?"
Stiles didn't have to ask who she was talking about. He shrugged, his eyes on
the brittle grass. "I have no idea."
"I just wasn't sure what you thought. Do you suppose he remembers you, after
all this time?"
The question made him feel anxious, more than the first question had. Stiles
had told Heather a lot about Derek, but he'd never talked about his curse, nor
showed her the ring around his neck. He crouched down on the ground, sifting
through the tangle of roots with his fingers. "I think so. I hope so."
She sighed. "Isaac Lahey asked me to the church dance."
"Yeah?" Stiles couldn't imagine what it would be like to be a girl, to have to
depend on men to invite you to things like that - but then, Stiles hadn't
bothered to invite anyone himself. "You think you're going to say yes?"
"I already did." She sounded more annoyed than happy. "It's not like anyone
else is going to ask."
"Probably not," he agreed, and ducked away from her swat.
It wasn't until they were nearly at the base of the ridge that he added, "You
know you're my best friend, right?"
"I know."
"And in my head, that's way better than Isaac Lahey taking you to any old
dance."
She glared at him. "I know," she repeated, a little more impatiently. "And I
know that - that you wouldn't even want to do that with me. So I'm doing it
with somebody else."
He nodded, feeling like he was missing something. "Yeah, I know."
"It's fine," she snapped, and turned to trudge up the hill. But a few steps
later, she turned and faced him again, hands clenched. "Your major, I don't
think he's coming back. Even if he's alive, Stiles, he's just not going to show
up and - and save you or something."
Stiles stared after her in perplexity as she resumed her climb. He wasn't sure
what he wanted to say to her. What in tarnation do you think I want him to save
me from? And what kind of blame-dang failure of a man would I be if I waited
around for somebody else to figure out my life? I know what I signed on for
when I gave Derek what I did.
But walking back to the house was like descending into a trench of uncertainty,
and by the time Stiles arrived in the kitchen, all he could do was stumble to
the table and sit there, staring at his hands.
Eventually his mother, kneading the bread dough, said gently, "Some days are
harder than others."
Stiles nodded, trying not to flinch at her understanding, because she didn't
actually understand, nor could she. If he said this isn't about Father, he'd
either have to explain it or lie to her. He didn't want to do either one. And
anyway, sometimes it really was about his father, and that wasn't a lie.
But he was still heavy and conflicted from Heather's comments, and his
uncertainty came out in the form of echoed accusations.
"Mother... he's not coming back."
She folded the bread over and over into itself, working serenely. "Do you think
I've not told myself the same thing?"
"It's been almost four years," he said. "How can you think anything else?"
She paused in kneading, breaking the dough into small loaves and shaping them
on the breadboard. "Stiles... all the wives of soldiers in the country, Union
or Confederate, have little falsehoods they tell themselves in order to carry
them through to the next day. Most tell stories about God -"
"Mother!" Stiles was genuinely shocked, not because he hadn't wondered about
God himself, but because he'd never once expected his mother to question Him.
"Others live in a kind of dream world," she went on, as though he had not
spoken, "in which they talk to their husbands as though they are still there. I
have this irrational belief, and nothing more: your father is going to come
home." She opened the door to the brick oven and neatly placed each loaf inside
to bake, then closed the door firmly before looking up at him. "Please allow me
my falsehood, Stiles. It's not harming anyone."
"It's harming you," Stiles protested. "Living like this? Tell me it doesn't
hurt, to wait and look and hope and still be alone at the end of every day?"
"I didn't say it didn't hurt," she said quietly. "I said it's not harming me.
There's a difference."
He watched her weathered hands grasping one another, as though through time and
pressure she could wring each lonely instant out of the day. In that moment, he
hated her patience and endurance, the way she bore his father's absence with
unquestioning stoicism. I can't do it, he wanted to cry, and have her hold him.
But he could not. His father was counting on the both of them to bear it, for
each of them to be strong enough for the other.
His mother sat at the table across from Stiles and reached for his hand. He was
always surprised how soft hers still were, after all these years of managing
the farm.
"It's the easiest thing in the world to live with pain," she said. "But don't
ask me to live without hope. I don't know if I can be that strong."
"No one is asking you to be, mother," he replied, relenting, but she smiled,
giving his hand a shake.
"We all have our own path to walk. This is mine. Yours... well. Perhaps you can
find your own story to tell yourself, just for today, to make the day
bearable." She contemplated him. "Tell me about him."
He looked away. She could not mean - no. "About what?"
"Anything you want to tell me." She squeezed his hand. "What do you remember?"
Stiles struggled to draw breath. "I... well, I wish I'd had the chance to ask
him about his commission, why he kept it from me, when I was - "
"Stiles," she said. He shut his mouth, feeling his cheeks heat. "Do you think I
know so little about my son that I would not be able to see the truth of the
matter?"
He shook his head, trying to maintain his equilibrium, but even sitting down,
he thought he might well faint dead away.
"I've - I've only told Heather," he whispered.
"Mmmm. That is probably for the best." She cocked her head. "I admit curiosity
as to his identity, myself, but I have not yet asked. Nor will I, until you are
ready to tell me."
Stiles was startled again, but recovered quickly enough to clear his throat.
"It's, um. It's Hale."
Her eyes widened. "Hale? Major Hale?" For a moment, Stiles felt fear, that
perhaps he should have kept his tarnal mouth shut. "My goodness, you barely
know him."
He shrugged. "l... it turns out that doesn't much matter to my heart."
"Well. That was unexpected." She shook her head in amazement, rising to her
feet. "I thought... well, it's not important what I thought. I believe this is
a moment in which a mother must embrace her grown son, no matter how
embarrassing it might feel."
Stiles took advantage of the momentary sanctuary of his mother's arms to
squeeze his eyes tight and cry a little, and she did not make any mention of
it. She did kiss his cheek and murmur quiet sounds of comfort, and that was
more calming than he would have expected.
"I knew you were suffering," she said, holding his shoulders and looking up at
him, "but now it is more clear to me how, and why."
After that, on the hard days, Stiles appreciated knowing that his mother knew
what was lacking, even if neither of them discussed it. Heather was still a
good friend and was more willing to inquire, but since her father had returned,
it had been more challenging for Stiles to feel connected to her. He still went
to Reunion Hill with her and sat up on Indian Boulder, but sometimes he
preferred to go and sit in the barn by himself, and close his eyes, and breathe
in the memory of Derek's skin mixed with the straw.
===============================================================================
September 1872 again
Stiles figured there wasn't anything more uncomfortable than waking up on
a cold boulder after the sun had dropped behind the trees, face smashed into
the surface of the rock. He groaned, immediately aware of all the ways in which
his poor body had not appreciated that impromptu nap.
Blinking at the sky, he groaned again, this time because he knew without a
shadow of a doubt that he was late, late, late for afternoon milking. His
mother would fill in, or Jess or Annie if they hadn't gone home already. Stiles
was usually more responsible than that, and he knew it wouldn't be the end of
the world for him to make one mistake, but he didn't like what it implied about
himself.
It was only because he crested the ridge at a jog and was moving so quickly
toward home that he saw the two figures before they vanished into the stand of
beeches. Men, though not soldiers by the look of them, at least the glimpse
he'd caught of them from the back. Stiles followed them through the grove to
where he knew it would emerge near his farm.
He could hear snatches of their quiet conversation. He was too far away to
discern what they were saying, but it was close enough to tell that they were
not in pain or distress. Stiles picked up his pace as he jogged along the
familiar trail.
And then he could hear faint words, and he stopped where he was, almost
stumbling as he jerked to a halt: "You still haven't seen all of it. I'm not
making any assumptions." The words didn't make a lot of sense, but the voice
was heart-stoppingly familiar.
But that was nothing compared to the weary, exasperated voice that spoke next.
"Derek, it's pointless, understand? Whatever this place was to me once, it's
not home anymore."
Derek. And -
"Father?" he whispered.
Stiles watched as the distant figures halted, the bigger one's hand on the
smaller one's arm. He gripped the nearest beech limb, willing his knees not to
buckle.
Stiles supposed it would have been easy enough to mistake another's voice for
Derek's, after one day of memories in ten years. Except that the other voice -
 his father's voice - had called him Derek.
Derek. The word was barely loud enough to carry past his lips, but he saw the
figure turn, his eyes widening as he caught sight of Stiles behind the beech.
Stiles felt the tension in his gut explode like a Ketchum grenade.
When he saw Derek's lips make the shape of Stiles, it was like no one had
really said his name since the war began. He couldn't quite believe he'd lasted
this long without hearing Derek say it to him again.
Then the other man turned, following the direction of Derek's gaze, and Stiles'
jaw went slack. It was his father - and yet it wasn't. His body looked the
same, if somewhat older, his hair more liberally shot with gray, and he'd lost
a staggering amount of weight. But his face was somehow vague, anxious and
grasping, like it was trying and failing to hang on to what was going on around
him. When he looked at Stiles, the expression didn't change.
"No," Stiles muttered, starting across the stand of trees toward them, "no, no,
you can't... you can't."
He had no idea what he was going to do once he reached them, but each step in
the dry leaves made the tension worse. It sped him up rather than slowing him
down, until he was less than a dozen steps away. That was where he stopped,
fairly shaking with confusion.
"Derek," he panted, clenching and unclenching his fists. It was too much, of
course, because he wasn't even supposed to know Major Hale's given name, but it
was all he could do not to rush over and try to kiss him. No matter what
horrors had befallen his father, Stiles was not about to do that in front of
him. But Derek just looked pained, and his father continued exhibiting nothing
but desperate confusion. Stiles looked back and forth between the two of them,
and asked the only question he could. "What's going on here?"
"Stiles." Derek's face hadn't aged a day, but it was shadowed. Whatever
emotions he might be experiencing were under tight reign. He looked at Stiles
impassively. "Your father is still not well and needs food and rest. I suggest
we take him to your house immediately."
Stiles nodded, speechless. He approached his father slowly, looking for some
sign of recognition on his face.
His father furrowed his brow, concentrating. "Stiles," he said. "You're
Stiles."
"Yes," said Stiles with a relieved sigh. But his relief was short-lived as he
watched his father shake his head with regret.
"Major Hale told me we'd be looking for you, and... that I might remember you."
"Yeah. I'm your son." Stiles heard his voice crack, and he clamped down on it,
even as he saw the flash in Derek's eye. His father turned toward Derek for
support.
"The two of you, you know each other?"
Stiles had no idea what to say to that. But Derek came around until he was
standing beside Stiles, facing Stiles' father, and put a hand on Stiles'
shoulder. It could have been casual, brotherly, but Stiles felt himself react
to the contact anyway. He hoped, considering the state his father was in, he
might not even notice. But his father looked at the hand, at Stiles, and chewed
on his lip, nodding slowly.
"Yes," he said, "I... see you do."
"We met long ago," Derek said quietly. His hand tightened on Stiles' shoulder.
"When I came to this farm to find you, before Antietam."
His father nodded again, somewhat impatiently. "You told me, yes."
Stiles watched his father watching them. Part of him was struggling to cope
with the sensations wrought by Derek's hand on him. Another part was
assimilating the reality that this was his father, and he didn't
even recognize Stiles - although both the impatience and the savvy way he was
looking at them made him think that inside, his father had all his wits just
the same. Still another part was wondering what exactly his father thought was
going on between him and Derek (and that part was kind of staring at his father
stupidly, because his father seemed to have brushed aside the evidence of their
connection with nary a grimace, and there was no way it could be that easy?).
"I... think I might need a moment, myself," Stiles said. He dared not look at
Derek, but neither did he think he could pull away from his hand.
"Your mother," said Derek. Stiles nodded unhappily. "She'll want to see him?"
"By Jove, would you expect anything else?" he snapped. Derek dropped his grip
on Stiles' arm, taking a slow breath.
"You would be surprised how many families who'd given up on finding their loved
ones preferred not to... to be expected to suffer through the trauma of
reunion."
Now Stiles stared at him. Still pretty, he thought. More than I
remembered. Almost too pretty to be real.
"That's horrible," he said. "And we never gave up."
Derek's lips parted, and his eyes flickered away across the ground, but not
before Stiles caught a glimpse of what lurked behind his mask. It made it
almost impossible to breathe, to move, to do anything at all.
His father came forward, looking grim and resolute. "Stiles, I imagine this is
a terrible disappointment to you, but... I haven't given up, either. I need to
meet - to see your mother. Will you take me to her? I hope at the very least it
will bring her peace to know I did not die in the war."
But you did, he wanted to say. You did die, if not in battle. But he nodded,
gesturing awkwardly. "It's - this way."
As they walked, Derek and his father together told the story of Lieutenant
Colonel Stilinski's near-fatal head injury at Antietam. He had been left for
dead by the Union army, along with thousands of other soldiers on both sides.
"Major Hale - Derek, I suppose I can call him that, if you know him - Derek
came back to look for me, but I'd been captured by Confederate soldiers. I'd
been stripped of my uniform by then, and I had no memory of myself, nor of my
life before the war."
Stiles tried not to think about what that must have been like, but his
imagination was too vivid. He grimaced. "Where were you?"
"Once my visible wounds healed, they took me to Elmira, in New York. It was a
prison for soldiers of war. No one recognized me - and no wonder, as I'd only
just returned to duty."
"The conditions were horrible," Derek said, his eyes dark. "I did not arrive at
Elmira until after the Colonel had been moved, but many prisoners died from
malnutrition and sickness."
Stiles' father trudged through the brush, pushing aside the scrub and small
trees. "I am still stunned you found me at all, Derek, especially after such a
long time."
Derek did not respond, but glanced at Stiles for just a moment. Stiles wished
with every piece of himself that he could reach for Derek's hand. But he had
waited this long. It was no real hardship to wait a little longer.
Assuming he still wants that, the voice in his mind taunted. Ten years is an
impossibly long time to be apart from anyone. And what kind of a promise can
one realistically make after one night together?
But Stiles knew exactly what kind of a promise one could make. Although he had
no evidence it was still being watched over by Derek, in all this time, he
hadn't yet recovered his heart. His heart hadn't felt like an essential thing,
and for most of the last ten years, he'd had no reason to miss it.
His father was going on. "It was five years ago when he caught up with me in
Scranton. I'd recovered very little of my memory and was doing odd jobs,
getting by. No one had made any effort to locate me, thinking me dead."
"We did not receive word of your death," Stiles said. They were nearly at the
perimeter fence. "I think they did not know, themselves. Perhaps they did look
for you."
He shrugged. "I think, if they had, things would have turned out very
differently."
"Look...!" Stiles saw the other two men startle at his outburst, and he tried
to temper his voice, beginning again. "Look. This... you returning, this is
going to be a big deal for my mother. She's going to have lots of questions. I
really don't think she's going to give you a chance to do much for yourself
once she sees you. Can we just... go to the stable and take a moment to wash
up, and rest for a bit? And then we can go into the house, I promise, it'll be
okay." After what Derek had said, he wasn't at all sure anymore, but he said it
again, just to have said it. "It'll be okay."
Derek nodded, watching Stiles' father. At his answering nod, Derek went ahead
of them, straight for the location of the barn, even though it was not yet in
sight. Whether he was guided by memory or scent or something beyond Stiles'
ken, he did not know.
Stiles followed, scanning for his mother, but caught no glimpse of her in the
yard before they reached the door to the stable. He went to the pump by the
horse trough, pouring a bucket of clean water and bringing the dipper cup for
them all to drink in the cool shade. The men took off their coats and
unbuttoned their collars, wetting their faces and necks.
Seeing his father there, crouching in the straw of his own barn, was the
strangest feeling. Stiles knelt before him, staring up into his face. "You
don't recognize this place? None of it?"
He saw that same intense look of concentration come over his father's face. "I
- I don't know. Not exactly, but... there's something... like a dream, where
things look familiar, but you're not sure what you've imagined and what's
real?" He gave a sharp sigh, shaking his head. "I don't know. I'm too tired to
do this right now."
"There's a cot in the back of the barn," Stiles told him, beckoning. "I set one
up after Harriet had a difficult time with her last foal." He didn't say
anything about how the stable was sometimes the only place he could sleep,
anymore.
He watched his father sink down onto the rough cot with a grateful exhalation,
as though it were a feather bed. He was asleep in less than two minutes. Stiles
stayed, standing there, watching him, and he thought, my father's here in my
barn and mother doesn't know he's here, and I should go tell her, but all I can
think about is -
"Stiles," Derek said behind him, his voice soft.
The tone made him lose his balance, stepping backwards - and stumbled right
into Derek's immovable chest. He almost cried out.
Derek caught him, whispering urgently, "Tell me this is all right, please, yes
or no, just tell me..."
"Yes," Stiles whispered back, turning around to face Derek, his arms fumbling
to wrap around him, "yes, by God, yes."
Derek didn't do anything more than hold him right where he was for several
minutes. When he did move, it was just one hand, shifting to stroke Stiles'
hair, to touch his cheek, and then returning to hold him steady.
"He's okay." Stiles could feel the sound of the words through Derek's throat,
vibrating against his cheek. "He'll sleep for a spell, and you'll bring your
mother in here soon enough. You're fine."
Stiles had no idea what Derek meant by fine, but he nodded anyway, squeezing
Derek tighter, tighter. Letting go was an impossibility. He smiled, trying out
the expression in the context of the situation. My father's here, sleeping less
than three feet from where I'm holding my - my -
"I still have your ring around my neck," he murmured.
Derek went very still. "Oh... Stiles."
"I don't want you to make that mean anything. I said I would keep it, and I
did. That was a long time ago. You're not obligated to do, or be, anything for
me."
Derek adjusted his hold around Stiles' waist. Now he was looking him in the
face. His expression was penitent.
"I would beg your forgiveness."
Stiles stared at him. "For what?" He shook his head. "Derek, you brought my
father home to me. You spent years looking for him. What kind of apology could
you possibly think you owe me?"
"I lost track of him," Derek said, gritting his teeth. "I took your
father away from you, and then I lost him on the battlefield at Antietam. And
then when I found him again, and it became clear he might not ever recover... I
couldn't explain the kind of debt I had to him, but I could no sooner have left
him than cut off my own arm. It was what I could do. For you."
"For me?" Stiles echoed.
"You gave me your heart." Derek touched his face with one rough and weathered
hand. "I do not treat that offer lightly."
An incredulous laugh escaped his lips. "Uh... no. It seems you don't."
"I cannot presume the situation between us will be the same as it was ten years
ago. Ten years can change a lot." He dropped his hand to Stiles' neck, finding
the ring with his fingers. It was as though the ring had a direct connection
with his cock, and Stiles bit off a moan. Derek didn't look like he was much
better off, breathing unevenly. "But I would ask you... I beg you. Once your
father has had a chance to resume his own life, give me the chance to make of
this what we will." He paused. "I do not know precisely how that might be done.
I can predict it will be... hard."
Stiles' mind was reeling. The possibilities in his mind were bright and
detailed and compelling, and only some of them were directly related to taking
off their clothes. Mostly they involved doing ordinary things together: working
the farm, eating at the same table, sleeping beside one another. Each one made
his heart ache with longing.
"I don't think I can have the things I want," he said. "I mean... what if
anyone were to find out?"
"The risk is not insignificant. It hurts me to think about putting you at risk
in any way. But..." Derek straightened up, raising his chin. "Hundreds of
thousands of men stood up against hundreds of thousands more to fight for what
they believed in. This is something I believe in just as strongly: our right to
live our lives the way we choose, free from persecution. I would fight and die
for that, if need be." He smiled, but the way it looked on his face, it wasn't
a friendly smile. "But I think anyone who tries will find me hard to kill."
Stiles was absorbed in studying his face. Being this close to it, it was hard
to think about anything else, but he managed to tell Derek the next thing. "My
mother... she knows about you. About us."
Derek's smile froze and his face went white. "You told her?"
"She guessed there was somebody. I told her it was you. She only replied, you
hardly know him." Stiles grinned weakly at Derek's surprise. "Which is true. I
still hardly know you. And I told her... it didn't much matter to my heart."
The white turned to red as Derek flushed, but now he was smiling. "I think I
may never stop being surprised by things that come out of your mouth, Stiles."
What about the things I put into it? he almost asked, although that question
was a dangerous one to ask, with his father right there in the room. But he
wasn't going to walk away with nothing. Stiles leaned over - they were just
about the same height, now - and kissed him soundly on his lips.
Derek made a surprised gasp. It was muffled by Stiles' mouth, but still might
have been construed as too loud - if Stiles had given a fart in a whirlwind
about that, or about anything at that moment. His father didn't move a muscle,
but even if he had, that might not have stopped Stiles, either. His attention
was all on Derek, Derek's hands in his hair, Derek's hips pushing gently but
insistently against him, Derek's breath rasping in his chest. Stiles moved his
mouth to the bobbing Adam's apple in his throat, biting hard enough to make him
groan.
"One hour was too long," he muttered into Derek's neck, "one day was awful, one
month was torture - one year was unbearable - and ten years -" Stiles licked
his throat. "- I don't ever want to do anything like that again."
"No," Derek agreed in a whisper, "no, we won't do that... Stiles, I don't think
we should -"
"Yes," Stiles said fiercely, walking him back against the back of the barn door
and kissing him again, "yes, I think we should. Right now."
Derek stopped arguing, giving himself over to the heat of their mouths on one
another. Stiles thought Derek had abandoned all control of the situation, but a
moment later, he felt Derek reach down with both hands and lift him up until
his legs were straddling Derek's hips, supporting him with no more effort than
it would take to lift a basket of blackberries. Stiles felt the unreality of
the situation coursing over him like the Potomac. He was shaking with it,
wrapping his arms around Derek's neck.
"You're really here?" he demanded, grasping Derek's face. "This - it's really
happening?"
"I promise you that," Derek said, between frantic kisses. "I don't think I know
anything else, but that, I know. I'm really here, and this is really
happening." Stiles could see the tears glistening in his eyes. "At last."
It would have been the easiest thing in the world to take Derek into the empty
stall and do with him all the things that had lived in his memory for all these
years. But the desire for release was secondary to Stiles' relief at the
contact of Derek's hands, the feel of his skin, the warmth of his body. That
alone was fortifying enough that Stiles was able to pull away, smiling against
his mouth.
"I want to thank you," Stiles said, "for everything, and properly. But I would
rather we had more time, and, uh... privacy."
"I think that might be able to be arranged, later." Derek let him slide down
his body to the floor, coaxing mutual desperate noises out of both of them. He
inhaled slowly, then let it out, shifting until only their joined hands were in
contact. "I did not want to presume you still wanted that from me."
Stiles chuckled to himself, shaking his head. "Whatever might have changed in
ten years, I think you can rest easy knowing I still want that from you."
Derek's eyes flickered down his body, and Stiles felt it like the touch of
Derek's hand. He flinched, listening to Derek's breath rasp in his throat. "As
I have wanted it from you. But now, I think it is time for me to employ some
self-control, and for you to bring your mother here, so I might explain the
situation to her before your father wakes."
The walk from the barn to the other side of the house felt unfathomably long,
but it gave Stiles a few minutes to collect himself. He could feel the new
pieces of his life trying to settle into place. No matter how welcome they
were, it was clear it would take some time before they fit comfortably. He
touched the ring under his shirt, and focused his thoughts on how he would
explain this to his mother.
But the moment he saw her shelling peas in the kitchen garden, all the careful
words flew out of his head, and Stiles could only stammer out, "Mother -"
She looked up reproachfully. "Stiles, where have you been all afternoon? Jess
finished the weeding without you, I had to gather in the dry laundry myself,
and the cows are full to bursting. And now supper will be late." Then she saw
his face, and she dropped the peas into the bowl, rising to her feet. "What is
it? What happened?"
"You have to come to the barn," he said. "Just - you have to see. I don't know
what else to say."
She did not question him again, but untied her apron and hurried after him. Her
face was set, bracing herself for whatever she might find. But when Derek
appeared in the doorway of the barn, she stopped where she was, staring at him.
"Mrs. Stilinski," he said, putting out both hands to forestall her, and she
began to cry.
"Just - give me the letter, Major. I thought, if they hadn't bothered to
deliver it, that there was still a chance he was still alive, but... it's
better to know. Give it to me."
"Mother, no," Stiles protested, but Derek came to her, standing as close as
decorum allowed.
"The colonel may not ever be the same again," he said, "but he's not dead, not
by a long shot."
She sagged at the words, leaning on Stiles for support. For a moment he thought
she might faint. "Oh..." she breathed. "Praise God."
"He was injured, long ago, and I've been watching over him for the past several
years as he's recovered." He looked so earnest, Stiles felt like he might cry
himself. "Ma'am, he's forgotten a lot. He didn't know Stiles, and he doesn't
remember you or this farm, or anything about his life here."
"It doesn't matter. Where is he? Major, I insist you take me to him
immediately." She went for the barn again, presumably to saddle Harriet. Derek
didn't stand in her way this time, but followed her inside. When her eyes had
adjusted to the light inside and she saw him on the cot, she let out a
soft oh, rushing forward to crouch by his side.
"I'll be outside," Derek said under his breath, but Stiles grabbed his arm.
"No. Stay." He didn't know how to explain how it felt, to consider being away
from him, but the way Derek's shoulders settled as he nodded, Stiles thought he
might understand. Derek fell into a kind of parade rest beside him, and they
watched Stiles' mother lay her hands carefully on his father's shoulder, his
chest, his face. His father gradually stirred, opening his eyes, and sat back
quickly when he saw her kneeling so close.
"Don't be afraid," she said calmly. "I'm Claudia... your wife."
"Yes." His father rose up on one arm. "Yes, Major Hale told me all about you."
He winced as he sat forward. "Forgive me; my body's forgotten what it's like to
sleep on a bed."
"You'll have plenty of things to relearn." She smiled at him, the kind of smile
Stiles hadn't seen on her face in years. "There's food in the house, for both
of you. You too, Stiles, once you've seen to those poor cows."
His father looked startled at every small kindness, but he did not shy away
from his mother, and he listened attentively to her words as they rose. She had
never been a woman given to small talk, nor did she resort to it now, providing
instead brief descriptions of each area of the farm, efficiently filling in the
empty spaces in his father's mind. He could see how hungry his father was to
drink it all in.
Derek and Stiles walked several steps behind, Derek's face amazed as he watched
them.
"Not much throws her, hmm?"
Stiles had to grin. "Not much," he agreed.
Derek looked at him now. "What about... this?"
Stiles didn't ask what this was. "I don't know. We don't talk about it. I don't
even know what this really is, myself, so... I think we wait and see?"
Derek didn't appear offended by his implication. It made Stiles breathe easier
as they followed them toward the house. They could take this one step at a
time.
"Watching him," Stiles said, gesturing toward his father, "it's odd. When I
realized what had happened to him, I think I expected that talking to him would
be like talking to a stranger. But he's not. He's still himself, even
if he doesn't remember. Right there - the way he holds his arms when he walks,
and leans in toward my mother as he's talking to her. It's all familiar to me."
Derek nodded. "I am relieved. I kept him away from you for longer than I'd
originally planned, simply because I wanted him to be well before I brought him
home, but... eventually, I had to give up on him getting entirely well without
help from his family. The doctors we spoke with in our travels suggested that
being here, around you and your mother, would be the best thing for him. In
time, simply being here might help bring back his memory."
Stiles dropped his voice further. "Am I to understand it is your curse that
helped you find him in the first place?"
Derek's lip twitched. "Perhaps."
"Did you... scent him? Track him?"
"It's not as simple as that." But Derek was regarding him curiously. "You truly
have no fear about my condition?"
Stiles coughed. "On the contrary, I truly do. But you have proved yourself to
be more honorable and trustworthy than most men, many times over. I don't think
I should judge you on any other merits than those."
That seemed to please Derek, and he was almost smiling when they entered the
house with his parents. His mother presented Derek and his father with bread
and brandy and slices of cheese while she finished supper preparations and
Stiles took care of the cows. They did not even make an attempt at formality,
but just sat in the kitchen with her while she worked, tossing questions back
and forth about Derek and his father's travails and the farm. It felt
remarkably comfortable, and even Derek's contributions did not seem out of
place. At one point, when his mother actually laughed, Stiles thought his heart
might burst with happiness.
But by the time they'd cleaned up from the meal, Stiles still hadn't figured
out how to approach the question of where everyone would stay. It wasn't until
his mother came to Stiles, her hands folded tightly over a pillow and an old
quilt, that he realized how much he'd been worried that she might expect Derek
to leave that night.
"Your father will sleep in your bed," she said. "Will you ensure the Major is
comfortable on the cot in the stable before retiring?"
She wasn't suggesting Stiles return to the house. Stiles nodded, then
hesitated, not wanting to press her, not when it was clear she was already
feeling the strain of the afternoon, but it had been just the two of them for
too many years for him not to ask. "Are you going to be all right here
tonight?"
"Your father is much closer to being home than he was yesterday, Stiles," she
said. "I will spend my evening giving solemn thanks for that."
It was as close to an answer as he was going to get. Stiles kissed her cheek,
then went to find his father.
He was sorting through the belongings he'd brought with him, lining everything
up as though each small thing were a relic of immeasurable value. Perhaps when
your memory is gone, Stiles thought, that's not far from the truth.
Stiles paused at the top of the ladder, but his father beckoned him into the
loft.
"Thank you for suggesting the rest earlier," he said. "This day has turned out
far better than I could have hoped, and I owe a great deal of that to you." He
regarded Stiles. "I suspect I was never a demonstrative man."
"No, sir," Stiles agreed. His father nodded thoughtfully.
"Losing my memory was difficult. It took me many years to see my situation as
anything but a burden. But eventually, I decided I must view it as a chance to
do things better the second time. This... this is something I can improve."
Stiles could count on one hand the number of times he recalled his father
hugging him. It caught him off-guard, and he found himself clinging a little
longer, his cheek pressed to his father's shoulder.
"I'm so grateful to be here," his father murmured. "Your mother is miraculous.
I can already see why I married her. And you..."
Stiles held his breath a moment, reluctant to meet his father's eyes as he
pulled away from the embrace. But his father's expression was complacent.
"You've done a fine job managing the farm, Stiles. I want you to know I'm not
here to take it away from you."
"It's been my home for most of my life," Stiles said. "I don't want to leave,
sir. But... I think it would be worthwhile to discover what exists outside
Maryland. I just can't be certain what might - might call me away. Or where."
"Or whom?"
Stiles tried not to squirm. "I don't know."
His father pressed his lips together. "I won't presume to speak for your
mother, nor to think my opinion carries the weight it once did. But I have
spent the past six years with Derek Hale. I know exactly what kind of a man he
is. I've trusted him with my life more than once. You're not going to get one
word of argument from me if your path follows his."
Stiles stammered whatever thanks were on his lips, picked up the blanket and
pillow, and shimmied down the ladder before he could make a fool of himself. It
was almost too much for him to hold in his mind: his father, home; his mother,
resolutely nursing his father back to health... and Derek, standing in his
parlor, hands behind his back, examining the portraits of Stiles' family that
hung on the wall.
He indicated the one of Stiles' great-grandfather. "He looks like you."
"My father always said that, too." Stiles stared at the picture for a moment
before holding out the quilt. "My mother wants me to - to help you get
comfortable. In the stable."
Derek's mouth opened, his eyes lit with startled amusement. "Really."
"My father's sleeping in my bed. Which leaves the stable, unless I want to
brave the biting flies outside. You..." He bit his lip. "You can have the cot.
If you want it."
"Straw in a dry barn suits me fine." The way Derek was looking at him was
making it hard to remain standing. "You can have the cot."
"I don't want the cot," Stiles hissed. "Nobody should have the cot. Unless - do
you want me to have it?"
Derek looked like he might burst out laughing any moment. "Just come with me to
the stable, Stiles."
They managed to make it all the way to the barn, the door firmly shut behind
them, before their hands were on one another again, tugging at each other's
clothes. It was obvious by the way Derek was kissing him that there would be no
more waiting. Stiles had the presence of mind to pause long enough to get them
a lantern, a bucket of water and a sponge, and to dig in the stable medical kit
for the jar of petrolatum.
He hung the lantern safely overhead, then spread the quilt on the straw in the
empty stall while Derek took off his shirt, but after a few moments of that, he
had to stop what he was doing and watch. Derek unbuttoned the cuffs of his
sleeves, looking down on Stiles with tense anticipation.
"I imagine you do not stare at other men like that, when they take off their
clothing."
"Not all of them," Stiles admitted. "And none when I know they are watching.
Though I do suspect Danny Māhealani of looking back, sometimes."
"You could have taken other men to your bed, but you did not." He eased his
shirt off his shoulders, draping it over the stall door.
Stiles shook his head. "It wasn't because I didn't want -" He paused,
embarrassed, holding the jar of petrolatum in his hands. "I thought about it. A
lot. When I - remembered you, remembered what we'd done."
Derek knelt, taking the jar out of his fingers, and set it aside before
beginning to unbutton Stiles' own shirt. "You have good memories of that."
"Yes," he exhaled, closing his eyes. "You showed me so many things. I never
expected to want it so much, but after that, it was... well, obvious that I
did."
"And yet you did not seek it out." He shivered as Derek's hands moved over his
bare ribs, his chest, and landed on the ring suspended around his neck. "Can
you tell me why?"
Stiles moistened dry lips. "I - lots of reasons, I suppose, beginning with -"
"Stiles," Derek said, his voice soft. He gave the string a little tug, and
Stiles bit off a moan. "Tell me why."
"Because I'm yours," Stiles whispered. He opened his eyes to see Derek
crouching back on his heels, flushed and staring, gripping the ring in his
fist. His other hand was between his own legs, his thumb rubbing rhythmic
circles over the growing bulge, and when Stiles' hand moved to join him, Derek
made a satisfied growl in the back of his throat. He also looked a little
apologetic.
"Selfish of me to ask," he said. "You don't really have to... to believe that."
But Stiles quickly shook his head. "I was not sure I did, until I saw you
again. But now, I'm sure. As sure as I can be about anything." He cupped Derek
in his hand and watched, breathless, as Derek's control slipped a little more.
"Whatever was there between us ten years ago, it's still there. Not just the
desires of the flesh, although..." Stiles pressed a little with the heel of his
hand, and Derek pressed back, his jaw going slack. "That's definitely still
there too - oh, please, would you...?"
Even before he'd spoken, Derek was already climbing on top of him, giving him
some explicit encouragement to lie down with a heavy hand against his chest and
a knee parting his trousered legs. Derek kissed him with enough force to bruise
his lips, but it felt so satisfying, so much what Stiles had been craving, the
pain was inconsequential. Yes, more, there, like that, was all he could think,
repeated again and again.
"You want to be mine?" Derek demanded, cupping one hand behind Stiles' head to
bring him closer.
Stiles gasped and tipped his head back when he felt Derek's teeth digging into
his neck. "By all the saints, you're really asking me that question?"
"Tell me again. Just tell me."
"I'd rather show you." He squirmed a hand between them, trying impossibly to
unbutton his trousers with one hand. Derek sat back, somewhat reluctantly, to
help him.
"I still need you to tell me." Derek gazed at him meaningfully. "Every day you
want that, I need to hear it. And if there's ever a day when you decide you
don't want it anymore, I need to tell me that, too."
"If there ever comes a day when I don't want to be yours, Derek Hale, I'll be
sure to let you know." He lifted up while Derek tugged his trousers off, then
reached for Derek's to reciprocate. "But I do not believe there has been one
day like that in the past ten years."
It still did not feel graceful, the act of coupling with Derek, but neither of
them seemed to care much. More importantly, on this night, Stiles had a clearer
sense of what it might be like someday to be skilled at lovemaking with this
man, long after they'd lain together for the fifth time, or the tenth, or the
fiftieth. It made him smile so broadly that Derek paused, touching Stiles' face
with one sweaty hand.
"You mustn't let fear, or any other thing, stop you smiling like that," said
Derek. "There is nothing I would not do to bring about that smile."
Overwhelmed by the events of the day, and giddy with the sensation of Derek
inside him, Stiles could do little else but laugh. "I think I believe you."
===============================================================================
October 1872, one month later
"Stiles?"
Stiles had almost grown accustomed to hearing his father's voice calling to him
across the barnyard. He heard it less and less these days as his father grew
more confident about the workings of the farm. Stiles had no compunction
against calling back, "I've got my hands full - ask Derek."
By the time he'd finally finished with the repairs to the pigs' trough and made
it across to where his father was, he and Derek were loading the last of the
corn into the wagon for transport to the mill. He grinned at his father. "Looks
like we beat the rain, after all."
His father gave him a withering look. "Who's we?"
"Less than a week behind this year," Stiles went on, ignoring the jibe. "That,
plus the good harvest, should net us a good trade for Lahey's alfalfa."
Derek lifted the hitch on the wagon and latched it firmly in place, then pulled
the cover down over the bushels. "It'll be ready to go in the morning. I'll go
tell Mrs. Stilinski we're finished."
Stiles' father didn't watch him go, but as soon as Derek was out of earshot (at
least by human standards; Stiles was privately certain Derek could hear every
word they were saying), he nodded after him. "He doesn't have to keep calling
her that."
"I'm not sure what else he'd call her," Stiles said carefully. His father
shrugged.
"Seems a dang sight formal for what we've got going here. Even Jess and Annie
call her Claudia."
There was no question in any of their minds that Derek was more than a hired
hand, no matter what he might be portraying to the rest of Montgomery County,
but what he actually was continued to go unspoken. Stiles' father had done the
most hinting and poking at the truth, but he'd mostly let Derek remain silent.
Stiles wasn't sure what he should say in response, so he didn't say anything.
Stiles already felt lucky enough to have managed to keep Derek this long into
the fall, past the time when Annie and Jess had bid them farewell until the
spring. Without Derek, they still had enough hands to get in the rest of the
squash and sweet potatoes and other crops before winter set in, so there was no
real reason to keep him on. Stiles also knew the amount Derek was willing to
accept in payment was far below what a man of his breeding and education should
earn. You give me room and board, Derek always pointed out when Stiles tried to
offer more, and wouldn't hear another word on the subject.
His mother seemed particularly on edge that evening, however, and Derek even
more quiet than usual while they ate. Stiles had to wonder what had transpired
between the two of them. Derek bid good night to the family as he always did
after supper, and Stiles let him head out to the barn on his own. He usually
waited for everyone else to fall asleep before following Derek to the empty
stall, and they both woke early enough to begin their morning chores. Whatever
anyone might suspect the two of them were doing together, on the surface it
continued to look respectable enough.
But later, long after he should have been abed, Stiles made a quick trip to the
kitchen for more kerosine for his lamp - and happened upon his mother, crying
into her apron. It was enough to horrify him, seeing his mother do that, but he
went to her immediately, hovering close and asking anxiously, "What is it? Are
you in pain?"
She shook her head, wiping her eyes. "Not in the way you mean."
"Then what? Did - did something happen? Did Derek say something to you?"
"No, Stiles, he said nothing. It is my own heart that is sore, all on its own."
She raised red, determined eyes to his. "I do not think it can go on this way."
"What?" He felt himself tense, glancing in the direction of the barn. "Tell
me."
"It is not fair for the world to be the way it is," she said, her voice rapid
and tight, and low enough to keep it from carrying. "I am grateful every day
for the return of your father, even if his memory has not returned. And I have
not lost hope."
"I know that has been hard for you," he began, but she shook her head.
"To be his wife in name, I can accept. To feel this abiding love, and to remain
constant, even if he - " She swallowed the rest of the sentence. "It is a
reasonable cross to bear. But to know that love exists in this house, and goes
unacknowledged... I do not think I can bear that cross. Not for my son."
"For - for me?" Stiles took a step back, feeling his face heat.
She looked at him reproachfully. "You may not look at me and deny it, Stiles,
not when I know how it feels to stand in the presence of my own husband and for
there to be distance between us. Watching the two of you... tolerating the way
it is... I cannot in good conscience allow that to go on." She reached for his
hands and held them tight. "Love is the surest of all of God's blessings. No,
the world is not fair. But of all the things in the world I can change, my own
household is one of them. And even if you cannot hold your love's hand before
the rest of Montgomery Village, I say in this house, you must be allowed to do
so."
"Mother." Stiles stared at her hand, not trusting his own voice. She took pity
on him and hugged him.
"For Derek to sleep in the barn like the hired help, and for my own son to do
the same every night, is an inequity for which I cannot stand." She put a hand
over his heart, covering the ring that still hung on its string. "And now that
I know what this means to you, Stiles, I think you must wear it properly."
He gaped at her. "People will talk," he stammered.
"People always do. My conscience dictates my life, not the gossip of the
members of the church rotary. Let me handle that." She nodded toward the barn.
"You bring him inside now, and tell him what I have said."
He had to hug her again before dashing toward the door, but he paused once
more. "Father does love you, you know. All over again."
She smiled. "I know. I waited long enough for him to court me the first time; I
won't give up on him the second time. He'll come to me when he's ready."
"I'm just saying, maybe he does not have the courage, without his memory." He
shook his head. "And I can't believe I'm talking to my own mother about her
relationship with my father."
"Stiles," she chided. "Don't tell me, after all this time, you're standing on
propriety. Go."
Stiles was still wearing the same enormous smile when he leaned over Derek on
the cot, scarcely waiting for him to emerge from sleep before covering him with
kisses. Derek woke laughing, fending him off with a drowsy hand.
"Am I to be denied my rest?"
"Tonight, you are," Stiles said. He helped Derek sit up, rubbing his eyes and
yawning. "I don't quite know what to make of it, but... my mother has
instructed me to bring you to the house tonight."
"To the house?" Derek repeated blankly.
"To my bed," Stiles clarified. He watched Derek's eyes fly open with amusement.
"It is no joke. Derek, she said we deserve to be able to show our love - that,
in her household, it would be a sin not to acknowledge it."
Derek looked as though Ebenezer had kicked him in the head.
"I'm at a loss," he said at last, somewhat faintly.
"Just come with me," Stiles said, tugging him to his feet. "We can talk it to
death in the morning. Tonight, let's just not question it."
He let Stiles lead him to the front door, hesitating only a moment on the porch
before entering the dark house. Stiles did not expect his mother to be waiting
for them, but she was, her hair already loose and brushed, wearing her
nightclothes and wrap. Derek looked embarrassed to see her thus, but she simply
smiled at him, reaching for his hand.
"You have been welcome in our home from the beginning, Derek," she said. "You
have earned your place in this family many times over. But this is about no
more or less than what exists between you and Stiles. I know I am not the only
one who thinks so."
"Ma'am," he said, and had to pause to clear his throat. Stiles was fairly
dancing with nerves beside him, but when she took his hand and brought Derek's
together with it, he felt everything inside him go quiet. Derek watched her
with wide, amazed eyes.
"Claudia," she said. "If I am to be the mother of your household, you should at
least accord me that courtesy."
Stiles could scarcely breathe to watch the smile that spread across Derek's
face.
"Claudia," he echoed. "It would be my most sincere pleasure."
She stepped forward, as composed as any lady, as though she were not in her
nightclothes, and kissed Derek's cheek. When she stepped back, Stiles was still
holding Derek's hand, and Derek did not let it go.
"I regret you will have to manage with the small bed, until Stiles can go into
town to buy enough cut boards to build a bigger one. Tomorrow, when you bring
the corn to the miller's. Good night."
"Good night," they said in chorus, and Stiles had to bite his lip to keep from
laughing aloud.
Stiles preceded Derek up the ladder to the loft, ducking with long practice to
avoid the low beams above their head. As Stiles hung the lantern, Derek sank
down on the edge of Stiles' bed, his eyes fixed on the arrangement of items
under the eaves.
"What are they?" he asked softly.
Stiles reached down and picked up the sixpence, handing it to Derek. "I
collected them from the fields around Reunion Hill. Heather - Mrs. Lahey - and
I, we would find the things the soldiers left and tell stories about them. Her
collection is even more impressive than mine."
He nodded, holding the sixpence in his palm. "So many things lost. So many
people."
"I can't imagine the magnitude." Stiles brushed Derek's knuckles with the tips
of his fingers. "But we can be grateful for what we have."
Derek looked into his eyes. "Unquestionably," he said, his voice hoarse.
Stiles slipped his hand under his collar and pulled the old, yellowed circle of
string over his head, biting it in half to release the circlet of gold into his
hand. He handed it back to Derek, who looked startled to be suddenly holding it
along with the sixpence. Then he reached down again to the row of trinkets,
picking up the ring Heather had found years before.
"My mother suggested I should wear that properly," he said. "If... that suits
you."
Derek paused only to set the sixpence down before reaching for Stiles' hand. He
shifted off the bed to kneel beside him, and although his voice shook, his
fingers were steady as they slipped the ring onto Stiles' smallest finger. It
fit better than it had when he was sixteen. Stiles traced the smooth metal with
his thumb.
"I have waited too many years to do that," Derek said.
Stiles fumbled a little, trying to find a finger on Derek's hand that would fit
the wide band, but eventually settled on the fourth. It was only a little
loose. When he interlaced their fingers, both rings shone in the lamplight. He
smiled, feeling his pulse in his throat, and lost himself for a few moments in
Derek's arms. We will sleep in my bed together tonight, he thought, heady with
possibilities. And tomorrow, we will build our marriage bed.
Derek's kiss was more insistent than chaste, but Stiles thought it was a
suitable kiss to go with the rings. He cupped Stiles' cheek in his other hand,
gazing into his eyes. "Is there any question as to what we intend them to
mean?"
"Nothing more than the reunion of our hearts," Stiles said. "Whatever else we
wish for ourselves, we have all our lives to decide."
===============================================================================
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EX1krt1vIgE
Must've been in late September
When last I climbed Reunion Hill
I fell asleep on Indian Boulder
And dreamed a dream I will not tell
I came home as the sun went down
One eye trained upon the ground
Even now I find their things
Glasses, coins, and golden rings
It's ten years since that ragged army
Limped across these fields of mine
I gave them bread, I gave them brandy
Most of all, I gave them time
My well is deep, the water pure
The streams are fed by mountain lakes
I cleaned the brow of many a soldier
Dowsing for my husband's face
I won't forget our sad farewell
And how I ran to climb that hill
Just to watch him walk across the valley
And disappear into the trees
Alone there in a sea of blue
It circles every afternoon
A single hawk in God's great sky
Looking down with God's own eyes
He soars above Reunion Hill
I pray he spirals higher still
As if from such an altitude
He might just keep my love in view
Must've been in late September
When last I climbed Reunion Hill
- Richard Shindell, "Reunion Hill"
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