For days following Boyd's death, the Hale loft was painfully silent.

Derek was gone. Peter stayed in the shadows. Cora stayed in her room. Rachel waited for her to come out. She did on occasion, going to the kitchen for food, but she didn't say much— she answered Rachel's questions with no more than three words & didn't stay long. Rachel didn't blame her, nor did she pry for more conversation, she knew her sister would need time. Much like Derek, who still had yet to return. Death, while it followed them closely, never became easier to deal with, especially in this particular situation when everyone was blaming themselves.

It wasn't any of their faults. As much as they all liked to think there was something they could have done differently to prevent tragedy, there wasn't. Not without endangering & potentially ending more lives. That didn't matter though, because no amount of reasoning was going to change the minds of those already convinced they could have stopped it, like Derek. Even thought he had absolutely no choice in what had been done.

Isaac had been the one to explain bits & pieces of what really happened, after Derek left. The twins & Kali had forced the alpha to kill one of his own; three against one was a war he would never win, and everyone knew that. Everyone except Derek. He couldn't see beyond the fact that his beta's blood was on his hands, in his mind, that meant the death was entirely his fault & he needed to leave.

One thing Rachel had learned over the years was that Derek didn't deal well with loss. He didn't deal well with any emotion, but anything in relation to sadness was particularly tough for him to handle. Perhaps it was because he always liked to be the strong one, the one who solved his problems with violence & never cried (ever). Rachel had never found out the exact reasoning, but what she did know was that whenever her brother was hit with so much emotion he couldn't help but show it, he did the only thing he knew how to do— run & hide.

He did it when he lost his family, and he did it when he lost her.

Rachel was like that too, in her own way. She didn't cry— no matter how badly she wanted to scream, she remained quiet (and rest assured, she had never wanted to scream more than she had following the aftermath of Boyd's death). She didn't like to show emotion because it made her feel weak, and the moment her enemies knew she was something other than a stone cold Hale, they could use it to their advantage.

She supposed that was why Derek left. The alphas had given him to the next full moon to join them, or his entire pack would be killed by them— implying that until then, they weren't going to attack again, but that didn't matter. Boyd was still dead, Derek still blamed himself, and he was going on a guilt trip to drown in the emotions awoken by that blame.

The only person who seemed to have a problem with that was Stiles.

"They were there for two days, hiding, waiting." Cora continued the story she'd been telling Stiles of one of the many times Derek & Peter had been found by hunters. She was standing, facing the window, watching the rain pour down outside whilst Stiles was standing behind her, a way back from the window. "That's what we're taught to do when the hunters find us.. Hide and heal."

Over the course of the story, Stiles had been growing impatient. He didn't know, nor did he understand why Derek had just disappeared after Boyd's death. He was also beginning to seem like he didn't care why, only of whether or not the alpha came back to deal with all the supernatural problems he left behind. "Okay, so is two days standard, or are we thinking Derek's on, like, some extended getaway?"

"Why do you care?" Cora turned away from the window & looked back at him, her expression hard. No doubt she wanted him to get out, but she knowing he was one of Rachel's friends she wouldn't say it aloud. Not yet, anyway— Rachel didn't doubt that if he continued to press the subject of finding Derek as soon as possible, she would have to stop her sister from literally throwing him out of the building.

"Why do I care? Let's see.. because over the last few weeks, my best friend's tried to kill himself. Your sister tried to kill herself." Stiles started on a rant, earning a glare from Rachel for the last sentence. Even if she had been found on the floor of a motel room with self-inflicted wounds, Rachel didn't consider it trying to kill herself— she didn't try anything. A deranged lunatic poisoned her with wolfsbane & forced her to do it. "Scott's boss nearly got ritually sacrificed. A girl that I've known since I was three was ritually sacrificed. Boyd was killed by alphas. I.. Do you want me to keep going? 'Cause I can, alright? For like, an hour.

"You think Derek can do anything about any of that?" Rachel scoffed. She was seated on the floor next to the window, tracing small designs on the window in the condensation with her fingernails. She had created an elaborate design, but wiped it away with the sleeve of her sweater as she chose to join in on the conversation.

"Well, since he's the one everyone seems to be after, it's more like he should do something about it, yeah."

"I don't know." Cora muttered, leaning on the table near the window. "There's something different about him now. He wasn't like this when I knew him."

Instantly changing from annoyed to intrigued, Stiles took a step closer. "What was he like?"

Both Rachel & Cora were about to reply, until the sound of boots against the metal stairs silenced them. The spiral staircase was in a particularly dark corner of the room, shadowing the view of whomever was walking down it & giving Stiles a faint hope that it may have been Derek. Both twins knew otherwise, though.

Cora & Stiles stayed quiet whilst Rachel mumbled a quiet "fucking hell" as Peter Hale approached them. No one wanted him there— no one wanted him anywhere except six feet underground. Peter knew they all hated him, but he chose to ignore it & wedge himself into the conversation by answering Stiles' question. "A lot like Scott, actually. A lot like most teenagers.. unbearably romantic, profoundly narcissistic. Tolerable, really, only to other teenagers."

"Thanks, Satan. You can leave n—."

Stiles cut her off before she had the chance to finish her sentence with an offering of bleach brownies. "And so what happened? What changed him?"

"Well, the same thing that changes a lot of young men." Peter replied, a ghost of a smile on his face. "A girl."

"You're telling me some girl broke his little heart?" Stiles gaped, unable to believe that Derek became the humourless, angry sour wolf he was today because of a girl. "That's why Derek is the way he is?"

The former alpha nodded. "Do you remember Derek before he was an alpha had blue eyes? Do you know why some wolves have blue eyes?"

Stiles shrugged, unable to think of a reason why. "I always thought it was, like, a genetic thing."

Peter shook his head. Stiles was better off believing it was, everyone in the room knew that without a doubt, but Peter would never pass on the opportunity to tell a heartbreaking truth. "If you want to know what changed Derek, you need to know what changed the colour of his eyes."

"Her name was Paige Krasikeva." Rachel reluctantly picked up where her uncle had left off. She had never said the girl's name aloud since her death, it felt weird— it felt like something she shouldn't have said.

"You knew her?" Peter raised a brow. He couldn't recall Paige ever being at the Hale house, just as he couldn't recall Rachel ever leaving it— but she had a knack for sneaking around without others knowing.

"I only met her once." The reflector stated, getting up off the floor to continue her explanation. "My sister & I were around nine at the time, but I still remember it. Mom was gone for the night. Derek was upstairs doing homework, Cora & I were watching movies with our favourite uncle Peter— the house was emptier than usual. It was pretty late when I heard Derek come downstairs. Peter & Cora were asleep, but I couldn't sleep until I watched the end of Space Jam."

"The only tolerable thing you ever watched on television."

"Shut up & let me finish my story." Rachel grumbled, shooting a glare at her uncle before continuing. "As I was saying, I pretended to be asleep until I heard Derek leave. I got up & I followed him. It didn't take him long to catch me & threaten to tell mom if I didn't go straight back home, I was about to leave until I saw Paige. Then, I switched to annoying little sister mode & made him promise I could be the flower girl at their wedding. All she had the chance to tell me was her name before Derek was practically dragging me back to the house. But I'm sure Peter can fill in the blanks."

"That I can." The former alpha agreed, opting to start off with his own variation than to pick up where his niece had left off. "A little background information on Paige; the girl was an introvert. She played the cello, and she spent all her free time at school in the music room practicing. Most of that time being after school, generally around the same time the basketball team practiced.

"Derek was a sophomore at the time, and the MVP of said basketball team— I'm sure you've all met someone resembling how he was back then. The stereotypical athletic teenager, arrogant & extremely irritating. Especially to Paige, who was only trying to practice her cello whilst Derek & his idiot friends insisted on bouncing the basketball in the hallway right outside the music room. It was like nails on a chalkboard to her, driving her mad & constantly disrupting her practice. One day she finally got tired of it & decided to tell them to be quiet—"

"But of course, that didn't go so well, did it?" Rachel cut in, interrupting Peter just as he had done to her before.

"Did you think it would?" He remarked, continuing on. "Derek, the typical teenager who prioritized impressing his friends over all else, acted like standard movie-grade douchebag. Paige ended up going back into the room, but Derek went after her— when I asked him why, he just said he felt like he had to, so he did. He couldn't explain it. With a little persistence, he got her name & found she already knew him, and that's how it started. Every day after school from then on, if he didn't have basketball practice, he was in the music room. Once basketball season ended, he never missed a day."

"His world began to revolve around her." Rachel commented, remembering all the times Derek had made excuses for coming home late. These were the memories she loved, the ones when her family was happy. They were the memories she fought to keep vivid while forcing those of the fire to fade away.

"Okay." Stiles began, interrupting the momentary silence. "So if Derek was a sophomore back then, how old was he? How old were you? How old are you now?"

"Not as young as we could have been, but not as old as you might think."

"Okay, that was frustratingly vague." Stiles sighed, turning to Cora. "How old are you?"

"I'm seventeen."

Stiles then turned back to Peter, pointing at the younger Hale twin, "See! That's an answer. That's how we answer people."

"Well, seventeen how you'd measure in years." Cora added on, deciding that seventeen was too simple of an answer.

"Werewolves can slow their aging process & sometimes even temporarily stop it— one that looks twenty could be a hundred, possibly older." Rachel attempted to clarify, likely only confusing Stiles more. She herself only understood it because she'd met werewolves who had slowed their aging; a part of her still believed they lied about their ages, but her mother had been the one to tell her. Surely her mother would never pass on a lie. "It has to do with their healing ability. So.. You'll probably never get a reasonable answer from anyone."

"Yeah, uh, I'm just gonna drop it." Stiles gave up, changing the subject back to the previous. "What happened to Derek & the cello girl?"

It was a stupid question, one of which the answer to should have been obvious. "What do you think happened? They were teenagers. One minute, it's "I hate you, don't talk to me." The next, it's frantic groping in any dark corner they could manage to find themselves alone for five minutes. Their favorite dark corner was an abandoned distillery outside of Beacon Hills."

"Alright, hold up." Stiles interrupted yet again, brows furrowed in confusion. "How do you know all of this? You just said they were alone."

"Back then, I wasn't just Derek's uncle. I was his best friend, his closest confidante. That's how I know." Peter deadpanned, pausing for a moment in case anyone else felt like commenting. When the room remained quiet, he resumed his storytelling. "As I was saying, their favourite place was the distillery. It was secluded, on the outskirts of town where they believed no one else would be. But what they didn't know, was that they weren't the only ones who used the distillery.

"Days prior, the Argents had taken a werewolf there to cut in half, after shooting an arrow through his throat. He had killed an Argent, and as I'm sure you've all learned by now, once one of their own dies, the rule book is defenestrated. Little did they know, this wolf wasn't an omega. He was a beta, one of Ennis'. This was long before the alpha pack was even thought of, so Deucalion, Kali & Ennis all still had their own packs."

"I remember this." Rachel commented, hoping her interruption would annoy Peter. "I think I met some of them. They were here for Mom, weren't they?"

Peter nodded. Stiles, on the other hand, only seemed to look more confused. "What did they want with your mom?"

"What wouldn't they want with her?" The reflector responded with a question, continuing on before Stiles had the chance to speak again. "She was an exceptionally powerful alpha, with the capacity to shape-shift that was rare among her kind. It made her a leader, the kind of person people would go to for advice & guidance." It felt strange to talk about her mother, but at the same time, good. The more Rachel spoke about her, the less she would be forgotten— and Talia Hale was not someone to be forgotten. "She also happened to have a daughter with supernatural abilities no emissary or bestiary could explain. If her power didn't draw them in, that sure did."

"She was the best of the best. I can't remember ever hearing of a problem my Mom could 't resolve. She didn't believe in killing the hunters— she always told us if we left them alone, they would have no reason to hurt us. Even if they tried, she never wanted us to fight back, only to run." Rachel continued. She still felt weird speaking so much of the past— even saying mom felt so foreign to her. A part of her loved remembering the times when she had a mom, but another part pained knowing she would never see her again. Knowing the last words she had said to her weren't "I love you," but instead, "I promise." A promise she had broken.

There were no words to describe the regret that haunted her every day, following her like a shadow. It faded at times, but it never truly left, and she didn't expect it to. The pain weighing heavy on her heart would always remain, and Rachel would never stop believing she deserved it because she couldn't do something as simple as keep a promise to return home.

"She knew that conflict in our world never ends with an eye for an eye. A skirmish becomes a war, a murder becomes a massacre. We end up no better than our enemies, and mom never wanted that for us. Any of us." Rachel stressed the last three words, shooting a quick glance at Peter who'd gone down the exact path her mother spent years guiding them away from.

She was at a point now where she could see the justification of most of his actions— killing the hunters, she understood. Kate & her associates deserved everything Peter did to them. Talia may not have believed in an eye for an eye, but at this point in her life, Rachel could. The deaths Peter gave the hunters were kind in comparison to what Rachel believed they deserved.

The reason she continued to hate him wasn't for tormenting her & her friends— just about everyone had done that by now. The unforgivable act was killing Laura, one of the few people Rachel had left. She could forgive the murder of those who deserved it, but she would never forgive the murder of her sister. Family was all she had left, it was everything to her & the idea of losing it was unfathomable.

"It's my understanding that Mom tried to convince Ennis not to fight back against the hunters, but he didn't listen to her. He wanted vengeance, he wanted the blood of the hunter who killed his beta to be spilled. Ennis didn't come for advice, he came to know if she was with him or against him, and she was neither. So he fought his own war." Rachel took a step towards the window, the glass now almost entirely clouded over with condensation. It was still pouring outside, the only difference now being that it'd gotten colder & slowed down a bit. She raised a hand, tracing a spiral in the steam with her index finger. "Our mark for vendetta."

"Man, you guys really take that revenge thing to, like, a whole new level, don't you?"

"It's not just revenge." Cora groaned at Stiles' comment, rolling her eyes at his inability to see & feel things from their perspective. "Losing a member of your pack isn't like losing family. It's like you lose a limb."

At first, it's excruciating— like losing a piece of yourself along with them. It fades over time, healing slowly, but it never truly goes away. It just goes numb. Rachel wanted to say she felt the pain Cora was referring to when Boyd died, but something about it, she didn't. She could feel Cora's pain through their twin connection, but she couldn't feel her own & it scared her to death to think that it was because she wasn't affected. She said she wasn't in Derek's pack, but she was. Even Scott knew she was, because the moment Derek was in trouble, she came running alongside everyone else.

He was her family, and Rachel could never leave him behind.

Rachel should have been hurt by the loss of Boyd. She was a werewolf, albeit not currently, and they were both in Derek's pack. She felt as though her heart was ripped in half at the loss of Laura, her alpha at the time, so why didn't she feel anything for another fallen pack member? They weren't blood, but they were pack. Rachel was saddened by the loss, as though a friend had died, but not heartbroken. She wasn't in physical pain, and she should have been.

"They wouldn't even let him see the body." Peter picked up on the story where Rachel had left off a minute ago, knowing the brunette likely wasn't aware of the rest.

"I don't get it." Cora interrupted. "What does this have to do with Derek?"

"Everything." The older Hale deadpanned, as if it were something she should have already figured out. "It's never just a single moment. It's a confluence of events. Personally, I looked at Ennis' circumstances, I saw a profound loss. Derek, Derek saw something different. He saw opportunity."

"Opportunity? To do what?"

"To always be with her." Peter answered. "It had only been about a month, but Derek loved Paige. She became everything to him, his world revolved around her; even if half his time was spent lying to her about anything involving the supernatural. The thing was, he had this constant fear. He was always obsessing over it, thinking about it all day, all night, always on his mind. One minute they'd be living the cliché teenage dream, the next, he'd be back home worrying about her finding out, because they always do, especially when it's as perfect as they were. In his mind, there was only one way to make sure they'd always be together. Turning her.

"I kept telling him not to do it. Every day the more he thought about it, the more convinced he became. You know teenagers. I bet he even blames me. He's probably convinced himself the whole thing was my idea, but it was Laura who told him about the packs being in town. There were more alphas than I'd ever seen in one place before. Talia would never do it for him, and the packs wouldn't be there for long, it was now or never. He couldn't stand the thought of her one day getting sick & not recovering— and one little bite would ensure that'd never happen. She would stay younger, more beautiful & always be able to protect herself when he wasn't around. The way Derek saw it, the bite was a gift."

"Being hunted every damn day of your life isn't a gift." Rachel scoffed, rolling her eyes. She wasn't so sure she believed everything Peter said, despite his steady heartbeat, but referring to the bite as a gift was something Derek had done in the not so distant past. Still, the Derek she remembered didn't seem like the one Peter spoke of. Her memories weren't as clear as she would have liked, but they were enough to instil doubt.

"But the ability to shape-shift between wolf & man is." Peter countered, turning back to the group. "Any of you know the myth of Lycaon?"

Stiles nodded. "I know it's where we get the word lycanthropy."

"According to myth, some Greek citizens believed they owed their lives more to Prometheus than to the gods of Olympus. And some followers even took names to honor the titans instead of the gods. Lycaon didn't just refuse to honor the gods. He challenged them. He invited Zeus to a banquet and then tried to serve him the flesh of a human being. Angered, Zeus blew the place apart with lightning bolts and then punished Lycaon and his sons by turning them into wolves. The part that's lesser known is how Lycaon sought out the druids to help turn him back to human.

"The belief was that the ancient druids knew how to shape-shift. They couldn't make Lycaon and his sons human again, but they did teach them how to shift back and forth. And so the druids became important advisors to the packs."

"They keep us connected to humanity." Cora added on to Peter's explanation. "But they're a secret even in the pack. Sometimes only the Alpha knows who the emissary is. Derek, Rachel and I had no idea about Deaton."

"Or about his sister, Morrell." Peter added.

"She's an emissary, too?" Stiles asked.

"For the alpha pack."

"Our guidance counsellor?" The Stilinski boy gaped, eyes wide with concern. This was certainly a plot twist he hadn't seen coming. "Why the hell don't you people tell me any of this stuff, huh? I shared some really intimate details with her."

The younger Hale twin sighed for the thousandth time today. "And did she give you good advice?"

Stiles fell silent for a moment, before replying. "Actually, yeah."

"That's what they do." Peter informed. "That's what Deaton used to do for Talia. Unfortunately, Derek didn't have am emissary to go to for advice— he only had me. And while I tried to advise against turning her, his choice was made. He chose an alpha & asked Paige to meet him at the school; only, it wasn't him there waiting for her."

"Let me guess. Ennis?" Rachel questioned, her uncle nodding in response. "Why him?"

"Why not?" The former alpha shrugged. "Ennis needed a new member for his pack. Paige was young and strong. Doing a favor for Derek meant Ennis would be in good with Talia. Back then, everybody wanted to be in good with her."

"He doesn't remember it was Ennis, does he?" Stiles asked before Peter began another spiel.

"If he does, he keeps it to himself." The aforementioned Hale replied.

"So then what happened? Did he turn her?"

"Almost." Peter sighed. "Shortly into it, Derek began to regret his decision. He saw Ennis in the hall, and he went at him. A fifteen year old boy against a giant, you can probably assume how that went. It didn't matter,though. There was no reason for him to fight. She'd already been bitten."

He trailed off, gazing out the window at the pouring rain & leaving everyone in suspense. Peter always did have a habit of being overdramatic; it seemed to annoy the twins equally, the two each looking towards the other at the same time to see who was going to snap at him first. It ended up being Cora. "So did she turn?"

"She should have. Most of the time, the bite takes. Most of the time." The tone of his voice said it all— Rachel knew exactly where this was going. She'd never seen the full extent of someone rejecting the bite, the farthest she'd seen it go was what happened to Jackson. That alone had been enough to invoke nightmares. She didn't want to think of how bad a fatal case would be?

"When you offered it to me, you said "if it doesn't kill you.""

"If." Peter repeated. "Once Ennis left, Derek took Paige to one of our hiding places in the woods & called me. The first thing he asked when I got there was "what's happening to her?" but he knew the answer.It didn't matter that she was young and strong. Some people just aren't made for this. But she fought. For hours. She struggled desperately, trying to survive.

"There was nothing he could do to stop it. Even her pain was too much for him to take away; she was dying, and he couldn't save her. There was only one thing left that he could do to make it easier on her, and that was to end her suffering. Derek was petrified— he had never taken a life before, but for Paige, he would have done anything. It was her dying wish, one he couldn't deny. He killed her. I remember taking her body from his arms, to the woods, to a place where I knew that it would be found.. Another in a long line of Beacon Hills animal attacks."

"And what about Derek?" Cora questioned, curious of what had happened to her brother following heartbreak— what part had truly changed him into the colder person he was today.

"Taking an innocent life takes something from you as well, a bit of your soul. Darkening it, diminishing the once brilliant, golden yellow, to a cold, steel blue. Like mine." Peter's gaze moved from the ground up, his eyes beginning to glow the aforementioned colour.

An icy blue, as cold as his heart.

Rachel fell silent, her gaze finding the floor as she thought over the story, her mind running wild. She'd always sort of known Derek killed Paige, but never had a direct confirmation of it until now; it didn't change her opinions. Derek made a mistake, and Peter was a liar— Rachel didn't doubt he found a way to fabricate the story without her & Cora being able to detect it, even if he'd only changed it slightly. Perhaps this was truly the way he remembered it, but the possibility of it actually happening precisely as he'd told was nonexistent.

If anything was to be taken away from the story she'd heard today, it wasn't that Derek's eye colour labelled him as a cold hearted killer, because he wasn't. It was that there was no love without loss & no peace without war— love was as dangerous of a game as war. All it took was one wrong turn & a domino effect was created, forever impacting lives in irreversible ways. Forever freezing a heart of gold in a block of blue ice.

The same blue Rachel couldn't help but feel as though she deserved.

—

UNEDITED.

holy balls this is a long chapter. almost 5k words! i didn't feel like splitting it because it would be weird, it's one continuous story. no set changes (aside from the switching between peter & gerard's storytelling). also, i keep subtly dropping hints on what's up with rachel, but i have yet to see anyone pick up on some of them. meaning i guess i'm doing this right— it's gonna be a shocker, i hope. for anyone bored who likes overthinking, i'm pretty sure one of the biggest hints is way back near the start of unspoken, but i don't think it would really look like a hint to anyone just yet with the information i've given so far. i didn't even know it at the time when i wrote it but now i'm really high-fiving myself for that one.

as always, comment your opinions! i love hearing your theories of what you think is going to happen :~)