┏━━━━⋆°.☾⋆.ೃ࿔*:⋆━━━━┓

FACE OFF

SURRENDERING IN EXCHANGE FOR THE SAFETY OF OTHERS WAS A SMALL PRICE TO PAY.

Emerson knew she would pay it a million times over if it meant just that— if it meant everyone else was safe from the warpath Deucalion wanted to go on.

He seemed to be upholding his end of the deal, much to her surprise, and it started with a simple conversation they'd had when he told her she'd be staying in his penthouse. The blind man assured her that no harm would come to Hannah from his pack, as they were instructed not to intervene in her affairs anymore.

Emerson knew that was his way of telling her that they would've killed the Prescott woman had she not accepted, but mow she'd be left to reside in that hospital room until the alpha pack moved on from Beacon Hills in due time. Only then would Deucalion permit her to give Hannah the bite that would heal her.

He was still as shifty as ever, rarely including the blonde in his plans because according to him, they were meant to be lying low. In reassuring her of the Hale Pack's safety, he promised Emerson that they would not strike first in an attempt to keep the peace. His heartbeat didn't blip, nor did it blip when he welcomed her home.

Home. What a funny thing that was.

It wasn't that Emerson considered that penthouse home, but it was more like a feeling. This man, this arguably evil man who she spent her whole life running away from, was her own blood. Sure, his methods were far from morally correct, but the way he'd so easily welcomed her in, thrusting a pack bond her way that felt warm. Familial.

She wondered if that's what it would've felt like to have a bond with her mother, had she been alive, of course.

Emerson found it harder to not trust him as the days blended together, even as he expressed an interest in her athletic achievements and even as he took into account the way she hated the colour purple. The purple curtains in the room he had set up for her were gone the following day after he discovered that, Kali whisking them away as she grumbled on about her talents going to waste over redecorating.

She was getting used to it, the brief normalcy she felt as being with family, that she didn't know what to make of Deucalion inviting her on an outing. An outing to meet Scott McCall.

"Why the sudden interest in Scott?" she asked, mostly out of genuine curiosity. Scott was a good kid, and had it given her a fright to see him in the elevator just yesterday? Absolutely, but she hoped her message of leaving a voicemail would resonate with them more than the way she left them in the dust.

It's for their own good, she kept reminding herself.

"There's something there," Deucalion offered, rather cryptically like he always did when speaking of werewolf matters. "I intend on finding out."

Emerson's stomach tumbled for a brief moment. "He's in Derek's pack," she reminded him, reminding him of the deal they'd made only a couple of days ago, before they'd ran into the boy in the elevator.

Deucalion only levelled her a look that spoke a thousand words, yet she could identify something in his pointed gaze. He knew something.

"Is he, though?"

Emerson blanched at the insinuation, shoulders deflating because although Scott had teamed up with Derek, he was not in his pack.

No, their deal didn't apply to Scott McCall, and here Deucalion was, bringing it up on a technicality. 

Had Emerson been even more of a coward who didn't give a shit about her human guardian, she would've never made that damn deal in the first place.

ೃ࿔*:⋆

It took little to no convincing after that to get Emerson to join him in meeting the teenager, partly because she wanted to be there incase things went south. They needed a mediator, so there she was, standing just behind the blind alpha on a broken escalator in the middle of an abandoned mall.

Her nose shrivelled at the dust floating around in the air. Couldn't they have met at a coffee shop or something?

Scott approached with an oh so familiar head of blond hair in tow, and Emerson composure faltered before she felt a flare of anger surge through her. No, this wasn't how it was supposed to go— he wasn't meant to be involved.

He wouldn't meet her gaze, and she didn't know whether to be upset about it or to be grateful about he. Her mind was a tug of war battle of just look at me and don't look, you won't like what you see.

"You didn't come alone," Deucalion noted, arms crossed as he held onto his cane in front of Emerson.

"Neither did you," Scott retorted, eyes cataloguing Emerson's looming figure before he gestured to the boy beside him. "This is Isaac."

"I'm not talking about Isaac."

A new scent filtered into her nose, one that physically made her lean forward. It was new, a smokiness to the person with an underlying note of... was that citrus?

The person emerged from the shadows, and Emerson had to bite her tongue at the distressed noise that was threatening to bubble from her throat.

Derek.

His features were already wolfed out, his crimson eyes settling on the scene before him. The second their eyes locked, Emerson's head felt like it was filling with static. He looked different in the dim glow of the abandoned mall, foreign emotions flickering in his eyes, but she could see the sharp intake of breath he took.

It was the same thing she'd done when she paired the scent with him. Smoky citrus, but really it was lemon if she wanted to be more precise. Emerson just wanted to keep looking at him, she was greedy in wanting his attention to be on her. Something that she'd thought in passing at the loft once or twice, but something that seemed heightened now.

But why?

Had he even heard the voicemail she left him? Did he know that she was standing alongside Deucalion for him, and yet there he was, still bringing a fight. Selfishly, at least if Deucalion went after Scott for whatever reason he obviously had in mind, she knew Derek would be left alone. By proxy, Isaac should've also been left alone, but he seemed closer to Scott now more than ever.

This was backfiring.

Their gaze broke due to the sudden onset of growling that echoed around them, and it was only then that Emerson cared to acknowledge the other two betas that emerged right after him; a girl who shared a family resemblance to him and Boyd.

"Derek, you can't do this so no one gets hurt," Scott warned the older man, obviously having some sort of an inkling as to what was going through his head. "If someone else dies—"

"Him," Derek interjected, pointing a figure right at the man who was standing in front of her. "Just him."

"Just me?" Deucalion goaded, and the casualness of his tone paired with the onset of emerging footsteps made the hair on the back of Emerson's neck stand up.

In an instant, the alpha pack had the others surrounded, and Emerson sure as shit didn't realize that Deucalion hadn't just asked her to come along— no, he'd asked the others too. Confusion was clear on her face, while alarm was present on the faces of the others and savagery was present on the alphas Emerson was supposed to be siding with.

Before she could even blink, or voice her confusion, Derek leapt toward the escalator, only to be intercepted by Kali almost immediately.

Chaos ensued, and Emerson dared to tumble down two steps of the stagnant escalator before a sharp hand grabbed her bicep. She tried pulling, but she was rooted in place by the man who was now just behind her.

"Let go of me," she growled, though her head was facing the fight that had just broken out. "This isn't part of the deal! You said they'd—"

"I had every intention of leaving the Hale pack be," Deucalion explained noncommittally, claws digging into the exposed flesh of her arm, "until they so obviously came here looking for a fight. The way I see it, we are simply defending ourselves."

She hated how he said that, how he said we. Emerson surrendered, but she didn't like the way she was now grouped in with the rest of Deucalion's cronies. It left something sour tasting in her mouth, oblivious to the blood dripping from her arm.

"This isn't fair," she sneered, her lips curled back in a half snarl, "this isn't what I wanted."

"Consider this a lesson, Emerson," he drawled on, all but forcing her to watch the fight play out. "Life isn't fair, and a pack that does not fight back is a weak one."

She'd been tricked, brought here to see the carnage of what would happen if someone went against the alpha pack. Just by being here and announcing his intent to kill the man, Derek was poking the fucking bear, and Deucalion was making Emerson watch.

It dawned on her again, like it had many times over the years she spent on the run, that there was truly no way out. Though, unlike before, Deucalion had her now, and he'd already proven that he would never let her go.

Not unless she was dead.

"What kind of leader would I be if I let these... transgressions slide?"

⋆°.☾⋆.ೃ࿔*:⋆

[ wyn's note ]

emerson..... wasn't good to trust deucalion of all people..... but the way he's spinning their deal on technicalities is insane and so fitting for him bro LMAO

longer chaps than normal lately (but lowkey they're just like 400 words more than my usual LOL) but still hope yall enjoy!!

also i think being able to have her sense of smell around a certain you know who is unlocking smth inside emmy.... more realizations to come

all my love! thanks for 38k!!