Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The key to smooth success was proper, near-excessive, planning and preparation. At least, that was Stiles’s firm opinion on the matter. Fortunately, the rest of the Beacon Hills werewolves agreed with him. Or, more likely, they didn’t want to waste the time and energy on an argument that was doomed to failure. 

Regardless of the reason, everyone came together to organize the last few details necessary to set the trap for the wendigo. 

Stiles’s dad had carried out the most crucial part of the plan this morning on his way to work —picking up the blood bags at the hospital. Armed with a computer carrying case whose padded lining served admirably as insulation for the ice packs tucked inside, John had met up with Melissa so she could give him the blood. His excuse, should anyone ask, was to see if he could get any more information from the doctors who had treated the wendigo victim Stiles and Isaac had saved. 

No one else had a good reason to be at the hospital, with the possible exception of Scott who could have claimed to be visiting his mom, but he had a tendency to look incredibly shifty and suspicious whenever he tried to lie or spin a story and was accordingly banned from such missions. (Which was why when they were kids, it had always been Stiles’s job to try and talk them out of trouble and Scott’s job to lighten punishment if Stiles failed. Scott’s puppy eyes were lethal.) 

Stiles’s dad had texted him after he had left the hospital with the blood, so, now that they were almost ready to arm the trap, Stiles drove to the station, picked up the lure, and was almost back. 

The rest of the wolves waited at the chosen location. It was near the walking trails but just enough off the beaten path that hopefully they wouldn’t have anyone stumble across it. The wolves would wait in hidden perches in the treetops under the well-established theory that hardly anyone, including supernatural creatures, looked up. 

Since Peter and Stiles weren’t entirely sure how strong a wendigo’s sense of smell was, they planned on splashing most of the blood out at their chosen site but holding some back and then waiting for a couple hours. If the wendigo didn’t show up, a couple wolves —probably Peter and maybe Erica and/or Boyd— would take the remaining blood and create some blood trails to their ambush site. If that didn’t work, they would reevaluate and go from there. 

The plan was still a little hit-or-miss despite their best efforts, but it was the best they had and Stiles was sticking to it. 

So far things were going smoothly. The wolves had almost finished using strategic placement of fallen trees to block off nearby walking trails and reduce the chances of intruders, and were just waiting on Stiles to get back with the blood. 

Stiles stepped out of his car at the entrance to the trails and instinctively tilted his head up to scent the air. He could smell traces of the rest of the wolves from when they had passed this way, as well as the countless people that frequented the area, but no sign of the wendigo. Satisfied, Stiles nodded to himself and shut the car door, locking it with an absent motion. 

Then he staggered, nearly collapsing and catching himself on the side of his car as panic, rage, pain, and fear raced through him with the force of a tidal wave. Stiles stared at his jeep, unseeing. Those weren’t from him. He hadn’t actually felt that. He focused on his packbonds. 

Normally, they hovered in the back of his mind, ever-present and warm, but largely non-intrusive. Now they screamed at him with the desperation of the corresponding packmates. Panic and pain from Isaac, rage and fear from Peter. 

Barely had Stiles processed that information that he was whirling around and bolting into the woods. The blood packs landed in the dirt by his car, utterly forgotten. 

Something was going terribly wrong.

Stiles tore through the woods, the trees flashed past faster with every stride as he pushed with everything in him for every scrap of speed he could achieve. Seconds dragged by in the spaces around his frantic heartbeats. Each one that ticked by increased his desperate fear that he would be too late to stop whatever horrible thing that was threatening his pack. Desperate, Stiles grasped within himself for anything that could get him there faster. 

With a sort of mental pop, Stiles felt something flex within himself and the world shifted in place. He pulled more speed from somewhere mid-stride, his next step sending him sprinting on faster than he could truly process. Stiles didn’t question it, his mind fully focused on reaching his betas as soon as possible. 

Stiles’s paws skidded in the dirt as he leaped a series of ravines from dried creeks and burst into the chosen site, fangs bared and hackles raised. 

Underneath the largest tree, Isaac rolled in the dirt, sharp yelping cries bursting from him as he thrashed and fought with the wendigo that was snapping at anything of the beta he could reach. Peter hovered over him, trying to pull the wendigo off or Isaac out, but his efforts were consistently foiled by Isaac’s panicked motions. The rest of the betas hovered nearby shouting suggestions and commands in desperate fear. 

Stiles didn’t hesitate. 

He tore into the middle of the group, nose down, and plowed into the tangle that was his beta and the wendigo. The shove carried all of the momentum of Stiles’s desperate flight, and the force of it sent both combatants flying in separate directions. 

Isaac gave a sharp cry of pain as the wendigo’s teeth were forcibly torn from his body and Peter was on him in a flash, catching the younger beta as he was sent sprawling. Stiles rolled to his feet, the move having tumbled him in a pile of jumbled limbs and saw the wendigo roll away into the woods. 

Stiles bared his teeth. It wouldn’t get away this time. 

Still, first things first. 

Stiles trotted over to Isaac and pressed his nose against his beta’s neck, scenting him and assessing his injuries. While definitely bloodied, the injuries seemed to be healing well. His beta would be fine, and could even join the pack on the hunt to take down the source of those injuries. Stiles’s hackles rose at the thought but a hesitant voice interrupted him before he could direct his betas to follow him. 

“Stiles?” Isaac whispered and Stiles suddenly realized that the pain in his scent was swiftly giving way to disbelief and awe. 

Stiles blinked and glanced around. All of the wolves were staring at him in various levels of slack-jawed disbelief. Except for Peter, whose wondrous expression held notes of fierce joy and pride. 

Stiles took a suddenly hesitant step back, ears and tail flicking uncomfortably. 

Then the awareness of those motions suddenly clicked and realization hit him like a physical blow. Stiles glanced down. Furred paws rested in the dirt, claws flexing in response to his mental command. 

For a second, giddy amazement and incredulity threatened to overwhelm him —A full shift! He was an actual, literal, ears-paws-and-tail, honest-to-goodness wolf right now!— But Stiles forced it all aside to deal with later. He could have his freak-out when he didn’t need to catch a feral wendigo. 

Focusing on the need to protect his pack and the current necessity of a human form to best do that right now, Stiles pushed away the shift just like he would a persistent remnant of a beta shift. 

Fur melted away and bones cracked and reshifted until Stiles stood there, unharmed and fully human. 

And wearing only his boxers. 

A brisk, chilly wind made that fact immediately apparent, for all that werewolves naturally ran hot, and Stiles gave a deep sigh, raising a hand to pinch the bridge of his nose. He didn’t even bother to try and cover up. It was too late. They had already seen everything, and besides, running with wolves and the way that their supernatural fights were invariably hard on clothes meant that modesty was a bit of an overrated concept anyways. He had seen far more of the resident wolves and they of him than anyone would have really rather preferred. 

Still, when Peter shrugged off his jacket and proffered it to him with a grin tugging at the corner of his lips in defiance of his deliberately straight face, Stiles accepted it and pulled it on with a heartfelt thanks. It didn’t do anything to hide his underwear or skinny pale legs, but at least he was warmer. And hey, at least he hadn’t worn his Batman underwear. Small blessings. 

“Stiles?!” Scott burst out. 

“The hell, Stilinski?” Jackson echoed.

The rest of the wolves stared at him in various levels of shock, clearly wordless for the moment. Though Stiles noted that Erica and Boyd’s shock was tempered by a “How the hell didn’t we realize that” sort of feeling, and Derek’s stunned expression was mixed with something that wavered between longing and envy. 

Stiles glanced around warily and then focused on Scott, wincing slightly at the expression of shock and betrayal stretching across the face of the person he had once called his brother in all but blood. 

“Yeah, it’s me. But I don’t have time to explain. The wendigo can’t have gone far. Now is our best chance to catch the blasted thing,” Stiles barreled on, well aware that if he didn’t head things off now, Scott would bog them down in a drawn-out argument. That conversation would come, but they honestly didn’t have time for it right then. 

“Peter, I want you to take point. You’re the best tracker and you and I are the most familiar with this thing’s scent. Isaac, stay close to me. The wendigo got a taste of your blood so he’s most likely to attack you out of any of us, and I don’t want him to have a clear shot.” 

Stiles glanced at the rest of the wolves. He was well aware that some of them wouldn’t take an order from him if they were on fire and he told them to jump in a lake, but if he could… 

Erica and Boyd were practically standing at attention, responding to his suddenly authoritative tone, so Stiles took a risk. 

“Erica, Boyd, I want you to flank Isaac and I. Stay slightly behind us, and keep your heads on a swivel. If the wendigo circles back, I want you in position to catch him.”

They both gave him sharp nods. 

“I’ll shift back into a wolf,” Stiles continued because werewolf lack of modesty or not, his current state of near-nudity was awkward. He gave a final glance over everyone, noting and ignoring continued states of bafflement, and nodded. “Let’s go.”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa.” Scott interjected, finally finding his tongue. “Hold on a minute. Since when were you a werewolf? Much less an alpha!”

“Not now, Scott. I’ll have to explain later,” Stiles said tersely and proceeded to end the discussion by dint of shifting into a wolf. 

Peter’s jacket fell to the ground where it joined a strip of leather that Stiles recognized as the belt he had been wearing, sans buckle. He blinked at it, thoroughly confused, and forcibly set his numerous questions aside. 

Distractions aside, turning into a wolf proved to be a marvelous method of ending inconvenient conversations. Can’t argue with someone who doesn’t have vocal cords. Well, you could, as Stiles’s numerous passionate arguments with his coffeemaker would prove, may the blasted thing rot in the deepest parts of hell with the rest of the unreliable, treacherous, fair-weather friends where it could no longer refuse to work exactly and only when Stiles was most tired and running late. But such arguments didn’t produce helpful results and only ended in increased frustration in the party bearing vocal cords. 

As such, Stiles was able to ignore Scott’s, and amusingly enough, Jackson's continued spluttering, turning instead to Peter who had redonned his jacket. Peter nodded once when he met Stiles’s gaze and pivoted, loping into the forest where the wendigo disappeared. Stiles followed immediately, and Isaac, Erica, and Boyd fell in around him exactly as he requested. 

The rest of the wolves followed after another moment of confused pause. Scott ran up to run parallel to Stiles, expression tight. 

“You may have put me off for now, Stiles, but you owe me one hell of an explanation after this is over,” he muttered. 

Stiles glanced at him, but for once, he wasn’t entirely sure what the expression on Scott’s face meant. He nodded carefully, and Scott nodded back stiffly before dropping back to run with his packmates. 

Stiles felt trepidation and some tendrils of guilt twine through his heart. While he stood by the decisions he had made, he had known when he made them that they would hurt Scott. He ran on, but his thoughts raced on without his permission and distracted him despite his best efforts. After a bit, Peter glanced back with a concerned look. Stiles grimaced, idly wondering how the mental command for such an expression translated across a lupine face. 

Still, in the face of his beta’s clear worry and sympathetic distraction, Stiles shook his head forcibly and shoved all his concerns aside to address later. 

The time for conversations and verbal fights would come later. Now, he had a monster to catch, a threat to dispatch, and a pack to protect. That had to take precedence. 

And so, Stiles bared his teeth and met his beta’s eyes with a fierce, fanged grin.

Tonight, they would hunt. 

Peter gave a sharp grin back and faced forwards once more, surging forwards with increased speed and determination. 

The pack of wolves tore through the forest in a loose formation, silent aside from the unavoidable sounds of their passage. Then Peter abruptly slid to a halt, spinning in a tight circle and looking around wildly. 

His eyes shot to Stiles’s.

“The scent is gone!” he said, disbelief coating every word. 

Stiles’s eyes widened and he pushed forwards. Sure enough the scent trail that they had been following vanished just ahead of where Peter was standing. And it was notably vanished. Not faded into undetectability, not masked by some stronger scent. Vanished. It went from perfectly normal and trackable to entirely gone in the space of a single stride, as if the source of the scent had ceased to exist or been plucked up into the sky. 

At that last thought, Stiles immediately began scanning the treetops above them in the off chance that the wendigo tried to turn their ambush back against them in more ways than one. Peter immediately mimicked him, intuiting his alpha’s concern. But the treetops were empty so far as supernatural senses could tell. 

Scott trotted up, frowning. “What do you mean ‘the scent’s gone’? That’s impossible!” 

Peter sneered at him. “Then perhaps you can enlighten us as to where the wendigo has gone?”

Scott’s frown deepened, but notably, he did not raise any theories. 

“I also can’t hear anything,” Erica offered hesitantly.

Peter’s gaze flicked to her briefly before turning away to continue scanning the trees around them. “Neither can I,” he said, tone grim. He raised his voice. “Everyone! Circle up, face outwards. We can’t rule out the possibility that it’s still around here somehow.” 

Scott whirled on Peter with a snarl, eyes flaring alpha-red. “I don’t take orders from you.” 

Stiles twisted to defend his beta, hackles raised, but was beaten to the punch by Isaac who stepped up to Peter’s shoulder and met Scott’s eyes with shaky determination. 

“Maybe not, but it’s still a good idea,” he said.

Scott turned his glare on Isaac who quailed slightly but stood firm, shoulder brushing lightly against Peter who had crouched minutely as if in preparation for attack. Stiles also tensed, watching with bated breath. His instincts were running high in this form and if Scott attacked either of his betas, Stiles honestly wasn’t sure he would be able to prevent himself from killing him. 

The standoff was interrupted by Erica’s shrill cry.

“Look out!”

Stiles whirled around to face the new threat, just in time to see a form burst out of the trees to their side soundlessly, lunging at Jackson who happened to be standing nearest to it. Derek had apparently seen the movement out of the corner of his eye because he threw himself forwards, tackling Jackson out of the way of the wendigo. The two of them rolled across the ground in a jumbled heap and the wendigo let out a shriek of frustration and disappeared in the trees opposite from where it had emerged.

Except for the shriek, the operation had been entirely silent, absent even a foreign heartbeat and —Stiles sniffed the air— entirely without scent. 

Stiles traded a significant glance with Peter. Even without words, he knew they were thinking the same thing. 

Something was very wrong here. 

However, the attack served admirably to distract them from the previous standoff. Scott pivoted away and lunged after the swiftly disappearing form of the wendigo. 

“After it!” he yelled and most of the wolves tore after him in pursuit. 

“No!” Stiles cried, or at least, he tried to. What came from his throat was actually more of a strangled-sounding bark. 

Stiles snapped his teeth in annoyance and glanced up. Peter was still by his side, looking just as frustrated and concerned as Stiles felt. Isaac had also resisted the urge to pursue their quarry, though he looked more confused than anything else, glancing between Stiles and Peter, clearly able to tell something was wrong, but not knowing what. 

Stiles hesitated for another second before snarling in frustration and sprinting after Scott’s pack, Peter and Isaac flanking him. He didn’t like this at all. There was no good reason for the wendigo to be able to hide from their senses seemingly at will. And then, to make matters worse, it wasn’t attacking like a wendigo should. This sort of hit-and-run, guerilla-style of attack was completely different from the single-minded, crazed bloodlust that all of his research had predicted. Nothing about this encounter made sense, and that raised Stiles’s hackles. An unpredictable opponent with unexpected abilities was a tactician's worst nightmare. 

Still, he wasn’t about to abandon Scott’s pack to whatever was going on, and at this point, who knows? Maybe sheer numbers would be an advantage. 

Of course, that didn’t stop him from growling under his breath as he ran and mentally cursing Scott’s obliviousness for not recognizing that something was very wrong in this situation. 

They caught up with the pack easily after a brief run. The other wolves were milling around aimlessly on a section of trail not far away from the site of the previous attack.

The wendigo had vanished again. 

Scott was pacing in circles cursing while Erica, Boyd, and Jackson watched anxiously, and Derek crouched where the scent of the wendigo disappeared, scowling at the ground like he could reveal the secret if he just glared hard enough. 

It was a very impressive glare, Stiles acknowledged, but he still didn’t think that particular tactic would yield anything helpful. 

Stiles caught Peter’s eye as they loped up and jerked his head to the left. Peter nodded and pivoted to circle around to that side, scanning the trees as he went. Stiles went the opposite direction, Isaac following. He couldn’t be sure yet, but he could see a pattern starting to form, and he didn’t want to get ambushed again. 

Scott’s head jerked up when they arrived. 

“Stiles!” he snapped. “How the hell is this possible?” 

Stiles blinked at him and somewhat pointedly tilted his head towards his furred and notably vocal cords-absent body. Unless he shifted back and was largely naked in a high-threat situation, he was incapable of answering anything. 

A muscle in Scott’s jaw worked and his eyes narrowed briefly before he whirled on Peter. 

“Peter! Answer me! How the hell is it able to do this?” 

Peter’s eyes flicked to Stiles first who nodded briefly, and Scott’s teeth ground audibly at the exchange.

Peter turned to Scott. “Frankly, Scott, I have no idea. It shouldn’t be possible.”

“Really?” Scott demanded, suspicion in every line of his body. “All of your supposed occult knowledge and you have nothing? Why do I find that hard to believe?” 

Anger flashed through Peter’s eyes and his claws flexed minutely. Stiles’s eyes widened and he stepped forwards pushing the wolf shift back to return to a human form. This was escalating quickly and the vocal capabilities of a human body were worth the added vulnerability and awkwardness. Peter’s mouth opened, likely to make some scathing reply judging by the offended fury in the lines of his body, but Stiles interrupted. 

“Easy Scott,” he said. “Peter’s right. We don’t know how the wendigo is doing this. It’s definitely beyond the scope of abilities my research suggested.”

Scott turned his glare on Stiles. It was surprisingly furious, and Stiles actually took a small surprised step back at the intensity. 

“Is it?” Scott hissed. “Or are you lying to me to steal the glory? Lying and stealing seem to be your favorite way to treat me recently.” He gave a pointed nod to Peter and Isaac, both of whom bristled. 

“Scott!” Erica cried in startled dismay, but Scott ignored her. 

Stiles met his eyes calmly. “I’m not lying to you Scott. I have no idea how the wendigo is able to hide from our senses.” He left the rest of Scott’s accusation alone. If he addressed it, they would get bogged down in that whole mess and now was really not the time. 

Scott glared for a couple more moments. “Whatever,” he snapped and stalked off, growling slightly under his breath.

Peter sagged slightly once Scott left, tension draining from his form. Stiles sighed and clasped his beta’s shoulder in silent support, squeezing gently. Peter closed his eyes for a moment in a long blink before straightening up in determination. Stiles nodded and dropped his hand. 

“Suggestions?” he asked. 

Peter gave him a wry look. “Leave?” he offered in a tone that suggested he wasn’t entirely joking. “Regroup, research, and try to figure out what in the moon’s light is going on here?” 

Stiles snorted. “Somehow, I don’t think that idea will go over well.”

Peter shrugged. “Me neither, but it still might…

However, at that moment, Stiles saw movement approaching fast through the underbrush. 

“Incoming!” he yelled, interrupting his beta and lunged forwards, shifting as he went so that his paws landed in the dirt as he positioned himself between the approaching wendigo and the rest of the wolves. 

Due to his warning, the others were able to face the threat and ready themselves for attack. The wendigo burst out of the trees, charging down the trail towards them. 

Despite himself, Stiles bared his teeth in a feral grin. By charging straight at a full pack of werewolves in a blood-craze, the wendigo had practically signed his death warrant. He was also finally acting like Stiles’s research said a wendigo would. 

The wendigo charged at them, over-long arms allowing the mostly-humanoid monster to travel on all fours in a twisted parody of a natural predator’s graceful run. The awkwardness of its limbs caused its upper body to jerk with every stride, but his eyes —blood-red and ringed with jet-black— remained fixed on them with unwavering intensity. 

Stiles crouched slightly, waiting for the perfect moment to strike. Beside and behind him, the rest of the wolves mimicked his ready posture, bracing as their quarry came to them. 

However, just before the wendigo got close enough that Stiles could strike, the wendigo’s eyes flared a bright white that encompassed the whole eye, no pupil showing. Immediately afterwards, the wendigo slid to a halt, limbs locked tight with empty white eyes staring at them unblinking. Though Stiles had the strangest feeling that the wendigo wasn’t actually seeing them. 

The werewolves froze, no one moving a muscle as they held a silent standoff for several drawn-out seconds. Despite the tenseness of the situation, Stiles’s eyes were drawn to one detail that he had missed before. Nestled against the wendigos throat lay a small amulet decorated with tiny rubies and runes that Stiles did not recognize. The amulet was no bigger than a coin, and small enough to be easily overlooked in the chaos of combat. But the wendigo’s current supernatural stillness provided a stark contrast to the way that the amulet swayed gently from the momentum of the creature’s previous charge. That contrast drew the eye, and ultimately, Stiles’s attention. 

Then, in defiance of every known characteristic of wendigos, the wendigo abandoned the pursuit of its prey without so much as a snarl, pivoting and bolting away.

The silence dragged on until Jackson suddenly broke it. 

“Am I the only one who found that really creepy? ” he demanded. 

“No, you’re not.” Boyd said, posture clearly revealing how unsettling he found the encounter. 

Scott stepped forwards hesitantly. “I thought that wendigos were supposed to be really single minded? All bloodlust, crazy, and unthinking when chasing prey?”

“They are.” Peter said, expression and posture tense as he stared unwaveringly after the wendigo. 

“Um.” Erica raised her hand like she was making a point in class. “Not to state the obvious, but that wasn’t exactly a crazed, single-minded pursuit of blood at the end there.”

Peter hummed. “No, it decidedly wasn’t.”

Stiles shifted back to a human form and immediately pressed a hand to his hip. He would have sworn that he was wearing a pair of his good underwear, but for some reason the elastic at the waistband wasn’t working properly and they kept threatening to fall off. Still, clearly he had more important problems at hand. 

As soon as Stiles resumed a human form, Isaac sidled up to him, pressing their shoulders together in a silent request for reassurance. Stiles automatically brushed his palm against Isaac’s back to scent him and act as a calming gesture. Some of Isaac’s tension drained away, but he still stayed pressed close. 

“Did anyone else see his eyes?” Isaac asked quietly. 

Everyone made some uncomfortable gesture of acknowledgement and agreement. Erica actually shuddered slightly as she did. 

“Yeah, what was up with that?” she asked. 

“I have no idea,” Stiles answered, a subtle note of danger underlying the words that made Peter’s head snap over to him. “But I intend to find out. It was… unsettling. And unnatural.” 

Stiles turned to scan over the assembled wolves, mind racing as he thought up and discarded plans with lightning speed. There were so many unknowns at the moment. Still, one thing he was sure of. 

“It’s hunting us,” he mused aloud. 

Reactions to that ranged from grim agreement from Peter, through horrified shock from Jackson, to outrage from Scott. 

“It’s trying to hunt us? ” he growled. “I’ll show it a hunter!” 

And with that, Scott tore off down the path after it. The rest of his pack followed with varying levels of enthusiasm. Erica and Boyd hesitated, glancing at Stiles before reluctantly running after him. 

Stiles sighed deeply. Amusingly, Isaac mimicked him, both of them watching with tired resignation. 

“Well, Alpha…” Peter began slowly. 

Stiles tilted an eyebrow at him. His beta sounded downright shifty. Peter continued, looking straight ahead so determinedly that Stiles knew he was avoiding meeting his eyes. 

“If Scott and his little band of minions are so determined to act as bait, it would be downright churlish of us to refuse them such a clearly coveted role…” 

Peter trailed off and Stiles sighed again. Unfortunately, he had just performed a dramatically deep sigh and was unable to sigh deeper without it sounding comically forced. Truly, his life was a difficult one. 

“You have a point,” Stiles allowed, somewhat begrudgingly. 

“What?” Isaac blurted. Even Peter seemed shocked at Stiles’s agreement, causing Stiles’s lips to twitch. 

“Scott’s not going to give up,” Stiles explained. “His pride is at stake now, so he’ll keep chasing the wendigo until something gives. I don’t want it to get that far, so, as much as the morality of it grates—” Here, Stiles gave a significant look to Peter, who at least had the grace to look sheepish and tilt his head in the faintest flash of throat. “—I agree that we might be able to take advantage of the distraction— ” Stiles emphasized the word and pointedly did not use the term “bait”. “— they provide to catch the wendigo off guard.” 

Isaac nodded though he was clearly still slightly uncomfortable with that plan. Peter, of course, was restraining his eager anticipation only barely enough to pass for polite company. Stiles flicked his gaze between them, then nodded, gave a few final instructions, shifted, and set off. 

They slunk after Scott and his pack, spreading out and weaving through the trees. 

The next time the wendigo attacked, they were still approaching and it managed to knock Derek down, getting a few good bites in before Derek threw it off with Scott’s help. The wendigo promptly disappeared into the trees opposite from Stiles’s approach. 

The attack after that, Stiles thought he was going to have it. The wendigo charged Boyd when the beta was standing a little ways in front of Stiles. Stiles immediately bolted forwards. The wendigo had enough of a head start that Stiles knew he wouldn’t be able to intercept it before it got to Boyd, but he would be on top of it not long after. 

However, right before Stiles got within attacking range, the wendigo’s head snapped up and bone-white eyes locked with Stiles’s. Something flashed across the wendigo’s otherwise blank expression that sent chills down Stiles’s spine and raised his hackles. Then, releasing Boyd, the wendigo fled. 

Stiles snarled, but knew better than to give chase. Any trace of the wendigo would have vanished before it traveled more than a dozen paces. Instead, he shifted and helped Boyd up, ensuring that the bite on his shoulder —all that the wendigo had dealt before Stiles arrived— was healing properly. 

Stiles’s check was somewhat perfunctory though. He was distracted and found himself continually sweeping the area with his eyes even as he offered Boyd a hand and gave him a friendly slap on his good shoulder. Something about that brief interaction with the wendigo kept setting off alarm bells in his mind and he stayed in a beta shift, wanting the balance between human opposable thumbs to help Boyd and supernaturally enhanced abilities. 

A few seconds later, after a far shorter delay than ever before, the wendigo struck again. And, in serving with Stiles’s paranoia, lunged past Boyd to attack Stiles directly. 

Had Stiles not been so on edge, the wendigo likely would have caught him off guard. But he was, and thus caught the flicker of movement out of the corner of his eye, turning and bracing for impact just in time. 

As the wendigo sprang forwards, supernaturally-sharp fingernails curled into claw shapes and teeth bared, Stiles lashed out in return, catching a too-thin wrist in each hand and twisting, using his body weight and the wendigo’s own momentum to throw it to the ground. Stiles followed it down, unwilling to release his prey lest it escape again. However, the wendigo took advantage of Stiles’s continued grip, and managed to twist its head around to sink fangs into Stiles’s wrist. 

But two could play that game. 

Gritting his teeth against the pain and the instinctual horror of being chewed on, Stiles refused to relinquish his hold and instead sank his own fangs into the back of the wendigo’s shoulder. Unfortunately, his angle prevented him from reaching the creature’s neck. As Stiles bit down and ripped his head sideways for good measure, the wendigo screeched, releasing Stiles’s wrist and twisting violently. 

Stiles cursed as the sudden powerful movement tore his teeth free of the wendigo and also forced him to release his grip on its wrists to prevent the awkward angle from snapping his elbow. Still, he dug his claws into anything he could reach and refused to let the wendigo get away. 

The two of them rolled across the ground tearing at each other viciously. Each of them dealing vast amounts of damage, claws and teeth tearing into anything either of them could reach, ripping skin and flesh with terrifying ease. 

But while Stiles had supernatural healing closing his wounds, albeit at a slower rate than normal, the wendigo had no such advantage. And so, Stiles ignored the agonizing pain of his many, grievous wounds by focusing solely on his all-consuming need to keep the threat contained and his betas safe until he could finally end it. 

Every blow that Stiles landed weakened his opponent minutely and he capitalized on that, even gritting his teeth and letting some of the wendigo’s strikes through his defense so he could take advantage of the openings they provided to deal more serious injuries himself. 

Even with Stiles’s ability to heal, injuries were piling up on both sides. Both of them were covered in blood, and Stiles was starting to feel slightly weak from blood loss, the shear rate at which they tore into each other too fast for supernatural healing to fully keep up. Still, the wendigo was worse off. Over the course of their short battle and besides the numerous deep gashes and bites he had bestowed, Stiles had also managed to break several of the bones in the wendigo’s hands, shatter its left knee, and even mostly sever the muscles and tendons of its right shoulder, rendering that limb mostly useless. 

But the wendigo was proving remarkably capable of continuing to fight despite what should have been crippling wounds and blood loss. Indeed, the more badly injured the wendigo got, the harder and more recklessly it fought, defying a normal creature’s instinctive drive to escape and live, and replacing it with an uncharacteristic, almost vengeful, strategy that cared little for damage done to itself in the pursuit of Stiles’s death or maiming. 

Finally though, Stiles managed to flip the wendigo over, pinning its left arm down long enough to slash at the wendigo’s throat. The muscles on the wendigo’s right side spasmed helplessly, but no amount of furious determination could move a limb with severed muscles, and Stiles slashed his claws through the wendigo’s throat. 

The wendigo went limp and Stiles backed off a bit, watching as the wendigo gasped through its final moments. The rest of the wolves closed in from where they had ringed the pair, the constant rolling and flailing of the battle between Stiles and the wendigo having prevented them from being able to assist.

Shortly before the wendigo breathed its last, the rubies on the amulet around its neck pulsed with a short flash of light, and the wendigo’s scent and heartbeat abruptly returned. Then its eyes, which had remained pure white through the duration of its fight with Stiles, suddenly faded back to a wendigo’s normal black-ringed red. As they did, the wendigo relaxed abruptly, blinked rapidly and slid his eyes over to Stiles. 

“Thank you,” he whispered, his voice faint, but full of heartfelt relief and gratitude. 

Then the wendigo’s heartbeat slowed to a halt, and his chest fell still. 

“The hell? ” Jackson demanded. 

Which, Stiles thought, summed up his thoughts on the matter perfectly. 

In the treetops a short distance away, a small murder of crows gathered, drawn by the scent of blood and its promise of fresh carrion, but held at bay by the commotion of continued combat. In a pattern as old as time, the scavengers waited for the battle to be decided so that they might feast on whatever dead resulted from it. 

As the wendigo breathed his last, one of the crows jerked abruptly and its black, beady eyes suddenly turned a bright, bone-white. 

It promptly took flight and landed on a branch above the strange collection of werewolves. There it tilted its head to regard them in a manner most unlike most birds, and remained perfectly still, watching, until they left.  

Then, without so much as a glance towards where the other crows gathered to scratch at the blood-soaked ground, it turned and flew off, bone-white eyes staring unseeing into the horizon as it flew out of Beacon Hills.