TRIGGER WARNING: MENTIONS OF BLOOD AND HARM
-O-
Malia growled at the two as she tried to claw at them. The restraints held her back, but that didn't stop her from trying to attack Stiles and Cassie.
"Stiles, Cassie, please go," she panted, trying to hold herself back.
"Malia, I told you; I'm not going to leave you. I won't."
"Yeah, besides, I hate parties. It's a social anxiety thing," Stiles said. "You ever have a panic attack."
"I'm having one right now!"
"Malia, look at me, okay? Just breathe. We're not going to leave you. I'm not going to leave you, alright? It's gonna be okay; you can get through this," Cassie encouraged.
"What if I hurt you?" she asked in a disoriented voice, still trying to claw at them with the restraints still holding her back.
"You're not going to, okay? I trust that you won't."
"But I want to!" she growled. "I look at your face, and I want to slash it! I want to tear at it. I want to feel your bones crack between my hands!"
"Malia, if you think you can scare me into leaving, then you're completely wrong because I won't leave you. I will stay here with you."
The sound of one of the leather straps ripping caught their attention immediately.
"You're not gonna have a choice."
Cassie stood up, backing up into Stiles, so that he would be away from the were-coyote in case she broke free.
"Stay here," she instructed him before going back to where Malia was.
"What? No, Cass-"
She turned to him. "I said to stay here."
Her stern tone made him listen to her. She then turned back around to face Malia. She knew Stiles was worried about her, but she knew exactly what to do. After all, she had delt with this kind of situation before.
"Malia, listen to me, okay? You have to concentrate. Not to the music and not to the full moon. Just concentrate on... concentrate on me and my voice," she soothed. "It's gonna be okay, Malia. You're gonna to be fine."
Malia lunged forward at her; one of her arms finally breaking free. Cassie tried to get away before her clawed fingers could reach her, but Malia had already slashed three large gashes on the left side of Cassie's body.
Cassie cried out in pain when she felt the tip of Malia's sharp claws reach her body. Fortunately, the wounds weren't that deep since she was already beginning to back away. Blood started to trickle out of the three slits. Cassie winced as she put her left hand onto the wounds, covering it up and putting pressure on it to slow the blood flow.
"Cass!"
"I'm fine! I'm fine," Cassie reassured.
Malia couldn't even comprehend that she had wounded Cassie as she was trying to tug on the other chain to fully break free.
"Just run. Both of you, just run!"
"I'm not gonna run, Malia. I'm not going to run. Do you know why? Because I don't care if you'll hurt me again and again. I don't care," Cassie spoke, stepping forward but at the same time, keeping her distance. "Malia, I think maybe you're so afraid of hurting me is because of what you did to your family."
She paused, waiting for Malia's reaction. The were-coyote stopped what she was doing. She turned back to face Cassie, waiting to hear for what she had to say.
"I know what that's like, Malia. The fear of hurting someone you care about; I know exactly how you feel. When I first got my powers, everyone around me was in danger. If the slightest inconvenience happened to me, things would fly off the shelves, the whole place would shake as if it an earthquake were happening. God, I-I couldn't even have a panic attack in peace. And the worst part was that I lived in constant fear of hurting my family."
She paused again, noticing that Malia wasn't growling anymore. She reached into the pocket of her sweatshirt and pulled out the key that was used to lock Malia into the restraints.
"But do you know what I've learned over the past few years?" she questioned rhetorically, slowly walking over to where Malia was. She unlocked the chains on her wrists as she began to speak again. "I learned that living in fear is definitely not a good lifestyle. But in order to not live in fear, you have to be in control. Not just in your powers or your abilities. In yourself and in your life. Which is why control is an important thing to have." The lock on the chains finally unlocked with a simple click sound. "I let my powers have control over my life and myself for a long time. Don't make the same mistake I did."
When Malia turned back to look at her, Cassie smiled gently, seeing the girl's beautiful face once again.
Malia's breathing had calmed as she no longer felt the urge to rip the two people in front of her apart. She looked at her fingers and saw that her nails were no longer sharp claws. She looked up at Cassie once again, only for three words to come out her mouth.
"I did it."
Malia wrapped her arms around Cassie and pulled her into a hug. Cassie was a bit surprised at first, but she quickly returned the hug as she brought the girl's head to her chest, rubbing the back of her head up and down comfortingly.
The affectionate emotion that Malia was feeling was soon drowned out by the smell of blood coming from Cassie's body.
"But I hurt you," she realized, pulling away from Cassie.
Cassie sighed, her gentle smile slightly dimming. "It's nothing a small healing spell can't fix."
Stiles replayed her words in his head before finally realizing an error.
"Cass-"
She looked back at him, sending him a warning look to not say anything. So, he didn't. But he knew the truth. The truth that Cassie didn't want Malia to know. The truth was that a healing spell really couldn't fix her wounds.
Stiles stood by the kitchen island as he chopped the mushrooms that were on the cutting board slowly. Cassie had invited him to a family dinner to officially introduce him to her parents. Stiles was definitely nervous. His anxiety was practically stabbing at him even after Cassie tried to reassure him that everything would be fine.
His shaky hands carefully chopped the mushrooms as Cassie was beside him seasoning some meat.
"Ahhh," he winced, feeling the knife slice his index finger.
Cassie turned her head towards him when she heard him wince. She saw that there was a small amount of blood coming out from a small cut on his finger.
She snickered. "You seriously cut yourself over mushrooms?"
"I told you; this is my first-time cooking in a while! I'm sorry I'm not the professional chef you are."
She laughed at the way he was exaggerating things. She grabbed his finger and looked up at him.
"Thank you for the slightly backhanded compliment," she replied, earning a small chuckle from her boyfriend. She looked back down at his finger, making her eyes glow a vibrate purple color. "Sana hoc apertum vulnus." She then blew on it lightly. The slightest amount of air wiped away the blood as well as the wound.
She let go of his hand as he stared at it in astonishment.
"Wow! That's so cool!" he gushed, flipping his hand over back and forth. She laughed again at his exaggeration as she watched him be completely amazed by a simple healing spell. "Wow, it must be nice to be able to heal yourself like this at any time or basically do any spell to yourself."
Her smiled quickly faded away when she heard the last sentence.
"Uh, actually, um... I can't do a spell on myself."
He furrowed his brows in bewilderment. "What? Why?"
"Honestly, I have no idea, but my guess would be that witches are supposed to keep nature in balance, so I think maybe that's why we can't do spells like this on ourselves. But there are some spells we can use on ourselves, like... a linking spell where we can link ourselves to another person."
"Oh, that's... actually kind of depressing. I mean, you guys were basically made to be selfless. Doesn't that bother you? Because it would definitely bother me."
"Well, yeah, sometimes it does bother me, but I like helping people, so I don't really mind or... care."
"Cass..." he grabbed her hands and held them in his. "You know, it's not such a bad thing to put yourself first once in a while."
"Yeah, I know, it's just... sometimes it's hard to do what you want even though you know it's best for you when someone else is telling you not to do that thing." She widened her eyes when she realized how she sounded. "Oh my god, I am a pushover."
"No, you're not," Stiles argued. "You're just really selfless. And to be completely honest, I have no idea whether that's a good thing or a bad thing."
"Mm," she hummed glancing at his lips. She stood up on her tippy toes and gave him a quick peck on the lips. "Now, come on, get back to chopping. My parents are gonna be home in four hours and dinner is supposed to be in four hours in a half."
"Okay, okay. Bossy."
She nudged him with her elbow gently, receiving a gentle nudge back.