Nature and Nurture: Finding the Perfect Blend

Chapter 5: the Nogitsune

"Stiles, it scares me that you honestly believe you're acting like yourself right now. You're smarter than that."

Stiles frowned. "I've been under a lot of stress."

"Deaton is right, you're justifying your actions."

"Don't talk to me about that bastard!" Stiles immediately tensed up. Derek placed a hand on his arm and Stiles could feel warmth begin to seep into him. "Just like Scott," he mumbled. The feeling made him relax and he sighed a little in pleasure.

Derek's eyebrows were in danger of slipping down his face if he frowned any further. "Stiles, I'm going to try to say some things now, and I need you to listen to me, even if what I say makes you feel angry or scared."

"Okay." Stiles shuffled closer to Derek again. "It okay if we sit together?"

"We've been sitting together all day," Derek pointed out, but moved so Stiles could lie against him. He picked up the blanket and draped it around them both.

"Yeah, but we never used to before. It's new, and we haven't actually talked about it. I know it's pack bonding but I want to make sure it's okay with you."

"You know that do you?" Derek said, somewhat amused. "It's okay with me, Stiles."

"Awesome." The warm feeling had travelled through pretty much every part of Stiles' body. It was a drug and he was quickly becoming an addict. "You can do the same. To me, I mean. I'm all good with the touching."

Derek sighed out against the top of his head where he'd tipped it into Derek's shoulder. "Now we have that cleared up, I'm going to talk now. No more changing the subject or interrupting, okay?"

Stiles said nothing.

"Stiles?"

"Oh, I'm sorry. Am I allowed to have an opinion, now?"

"God. Would you just," Derek sighed. "Never mind."

Derek shuffled them around a bit until Stiles was completely curled up in his arms. He didn't mind being man-handled in the slightest if this was the outcome.

"Stiles, you said you were fae." Stiles tensed, but Derek shushed him before he could deny it. "I'm not asking you to talk about it. I'm going to tell you a story my mother told me about the wild folk. There was a time when Beacon Hills had their fair share of them. The preserve was their home and they lived and died without most humans coming into contact with them. There was the odd sighting here and there; someone would mention lights coming from the woods, hear laughter that came from nowhere, the even rarer occurrence of someone disappearing off the trails. But for the most part the only humans in Beacon Hills who knew of nature's spirits were druids and the emissaries of the Hale Pack."

Stiles shuddered at the mention of the druids. Derek rubbed a hand over his arm.

"By the time my mother was Alpha, the wild folk had almost moved on. It happened all over the world, a lessoning of natural magic, of belief in the supernatural. My mother never mentioned if she personally had any dealings with them, but she did say one thing. The Wild Folk, the Fae, the Sidhe; they smell like the wilder parts of nature to a wolf's nose. They make fur stand on end. They confuse the wolf's instincts and are always tricky and can hardly ever be trusted."

"Do you believe that?" Stiles whispered.

"It fits with what Scott scented in the preserve. If they've come back, it explains what's happening to you."

"No. Do I smell wrong to you?"

"No! And fae don't smell wrong. They're supposed to smell more natural than anything else."